The way she said nice made it sound like a terminal diagnosis.
I leaned back again. Processed what she’d actually said underneath all the corporate speak and control issues.
She was worried. About . About what would happen if the internet decided to care about who I was.
Which ant I needed to make this very clear very fast.
"Listen. I took Cassidy to get bubble tea because she looked like she wanted to throw herself into traffic. That’s it. There’s no secret romance. No ulterior motives. Just one person helping another person not have a complete breakdown." I held Vivienne’s stare. "And I’m not going to stop doing that because photographers exist."
"Then you’re a liability."
"Then fire ."
Her mouth opened. Closed. Opened again.
"What?"
"You heard . If helping your sister when she’s upset makes a liability, then terminate my contract. I’ll sign whatever paperwork. We’ll both move on."
I stood up now, which brought us approximately six inches apart because her desk wasn’t that big and her study wasn’t that spacious.
"But if you keep , you keep all of . Including the part that gives a damn when soone I’m working with is struggling. I’m not going to ask permission to be a decent human."
She stared at . Her breathing had gone shallow. I could see her chest rising and falling faster than normal beneath her blazer.
"You can’t talk to like that."
"Pretty sure I just did."
"I’m your employer."
"You’re seventeen."
"I run operations for a multi-billion dollar company."
"And I raise a fourteen-year-old kid while working two jobs. We’re both too young for what we’re doing. Doesn’t make either of us less real."
The silence that followed felt like standing at the edge of sothing. Like one more word would tip us over into territory we couldn’t co back from.
Vivienne broke first.
"I’m trying to protect you."
"I know."
"You’re making it very difficult."
"I know that too."
She made a sound that might have been frustration or might have been a laugh that died halfway. Her hand ca up like she was going to adjust my collar again. That seed to be her thing. Finding excuses to touch while pretending it was about appearances.
But she stopped herself this ti. Let her hand fall.
"The tailor appointnt is still tomorrow at three. You’re still getting a proper suit. And you’re still coming to the launch party on Saturday." Her voice had lost so of its ice. "But we need to establish boundaries. Real ones. Before this gets worse."
"Worse how?"
"Worse like my mother sees it and decides you’re a distraction that needs removing."
She walked to her window. Looked out at the gardens where the light was dying and the shadows were getting longer.
"I don’t want to fire you, Isaiah. You’re actually good at this job. Better than I expected. But I need you to understand what you signed up for."
"I signed up to tutor Cassidy and manage schedules."
"You signed up to enter our lives. That cos with complications you didn’t account for." She glanced back at . "We’re not normal."
"I noticed. The swan pond kind of gave it away."
Her lips twitched. Almost a smile. Then it was gone.
"Tomorrow morning, you’ll et with our PR team. They’ll give you dia training. What to say if anyone approaches you. How to deflect questions. Why you should never, under any circumstances, confirm or deny anything about your relationship with any of us."
"There is no relationship."
"So you don’t think there could be?"
I blinked. "What?"
"A relationship." Vivienne was still facing the window. Her reflection in the glass showed purple eyes that weren’t looking at the gardens at all. "You said there isn’t one. I’m asking if you think there could be. Hypothetically."
My brain, which had survived three years of Hartwell on minimal sleep and maximum spite, chose this exact mont to abandon ship.
"I don’t... that’s not..."
"It’s a simple question, Isaiah."
Nothing about this was simple. Nothing about any of this had been simple since the mont I spilled coffee on her sister and accidentally stumbled into the most complicated month of my entire life.
"You’re my employer," I said. Safe answer. Professional answer. The kind of answer that wouldn’t get fired or make this conversation worse than it already was.
"That’s not what I asked."
She turned around. Walked back toward the desk. Toward .
I was still standing because sitting felt like weakness right now. Like giving ground. But standing ant I was exactly eye level with her when she stopped approximately six inches from my chest.
Six inches felt like six milliters.
"I asked," she continued, and her voice had dropped to sothing quieter, "if you think it’s impossible. Given everything. Given who we are."
"You’re Vivienne Valentine. I’m a scholarship kid from Kensington who eats instant ran four tis a week."
"Not anymore. You’re wearing Brunello Cucinelli and driving a Lexus."
"That I borrowed. From you. Because you’re paying ."
"So if I stopped paying you, you’d stop wearing nice clothes?"
"If you stopped paying , I’d stop showing up."
Her jaw did sothing complicated. Like she wanted to argue but couldn’t find the right angle of attack.
I should have shut up. I should have thanked her for her concern, promised to be more careful, and gotten the hell out of her study before I said sothing that couldn’t be unsaid.
Instead I kept talking. Because apparently surviving on four hours of sleep for three years had permanently damaged my self-preservation instincts.
"You want to know what I think?" I asked. "I think this job was always going to blow up in my face. Seven assistants before . All of them quit or got fired. The odds were never good."
"Then why take it?"
"Because ten thousand a month changes my life. Changes Iris’s life. I’d have taken this job even if I knew it would end badly."
"That’s depressingly practical."
"That’s reality. You of all people should appreciate that."
Sothing crossed her face. Hurt, maybe. Or recognition.
She looked down at her hands. They were shaking slightly. Just enough that I noticed.
"I don’t want to be seen with the help," she said quietly. "I wouldn’t mind being seen with you."
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