Chapter 5
603words
Her phone rang straight to voicemail.
His texts disappeared into the digital void.
Alex's irritation quickly morphed into something unfamiliar—raw panic.
He snatched his car keys and bolted from the office, not even bothering to call his driver.
The motion-sensor lights in her old apartment building flickered erratically, casting eerie shadows down the hallway.
The air reeked of dampness and day-old takeout—a world away from his sanitized existence.
This gritty reality clashed violently with his polished, elegant world.
Emma's door hung slightly open.
Alex pushed it wider to find Emma curled into herself on the bed, her face ghostly white.
Fever had claimed her—cracked lips, furrowed brow, completely oblivious to his presence.
In a heartbeat, his irritation and fear crystallized into something sharper—pure ache.
This girl—academically brilliant and unflinchingly dignified before power—now looked fragile as spun glass.
He didn't reach for his phone to summon his private physician.
Instead, he crossed to her bedside and pressed the back of his hand against her burning forehead.
Then, with a clumsiness foreign to his nature, he began caring for her himself.
He rushed to the pharmacy for fever reducers and a thermometer, then attempted to cook plain porridge in her cramped kitchenette.
The porridge scorched, filling the apartment with acrid smoke that sent Emma into a coughing fit.
She cracked her eyes open, the world swimming before her.
Through the haze, she saw the titan of industry frantically waving a spatula, his thousand-dollar shirt smeared with black soot.
In that moment, he wasn't Alexander Romano, billionaire—just a man completely out of his depth, for her sake.
Something in Emma's chest crumbled.
When her fever finally broke and clarity returned, Alex had cleaned the kitchen disaster and brought her warm water.
The room fell quiet except for the occasional car passing outside her window.
"Emma."
He perched on the chair beside her bed, his voice rough with emotion.
"I want to give you everything—all the best things this world has to offer."
Emma's lashes fluttered as she studied him, her gaze still hazy from fever.
"Why?"
"Because you make me want to be better than I am."
Alex's eyes darkened with emotions he barely recognized, let alone controlled.
He leaned closer, his voice dropping to a whisper that carried a note of pleading.
"Let me take care of you."
Emma stared into his eyes, seeing herself reflected in their depths.
Her mother's warnings echoed in her mind, alongside her own vows of independence and her fear of becoming dependent on anyone.
But then she remembered his quiet companionship in the library, his disastrous attempt at porridge, and the naked adoration in his eyes right now.
One word escaped her parched lips.
"Yes."
Alex's eyes blazed to life, as if he'd captured all the city's lights within them.
He bent down and brushed his lips against hers.
The kiss was achingly tender—exploratory and comforting, without lust yet somehow more intimate than passion.
When he pulled back, Emma's cheeks flushed with a heat that had nothing to do with fever.
She touched her lips, still warm from his.
Just like that, she had become his.
Alex drove home with the city lights fading in his rearview mirror.
He'd gotten exactly what he wanted.
Victory surged through his chest.
Yet beneath this triumph lurked something darker—something he couldn't ignore.
His possessiveness toward Emma ran deeper than anything he'd ever felt.
It was a primal urge to absorb her into himself, to make her entirely his.
This feeling transcended anything he'd experienced in previous relationships.
And it terrified him.
