Chapter 9 Daniel

For a man like Daniel, committing to a team was an act of extraordinary defiance against his own nature. He had always believed that the path of life was an individual's absolute right, a philosophy that made him allergic to groups, schedules, and corporate structures.

His decision to join Scripted Hearts hadn't been about the business or the art. It had been about a personal interest so profound it paralyzed him. For two years, he had been happy to let himself be bound by Caroline's gravity-worshiping her from the edges of friendship, clinging to her world without ever demanding a status of his own. He was the poet who never read his best lines aloud.

But tonight, his carefully constructed world had been struck by a high-velocity shell.

I'm getting married. It's an arranged marriage. The project we are working on is my own wedding invitation.

The words had scattered the rubble of his imagination. Every scenario he had built for their future-the "one day" when he would finally tell her-was gone.

"Just my luck," Daniel whispered, the wind of Havenport Heights whipping his hair. "I'm living in a nightmare I didn't even write."

He realized now that the "friendship zone" he had built wasn't a sanctuary; it was an atom bomb with a slow-burning fuse. He had spent 17,520 hours-sixty-three million seconds-loving her in the dark. He had been the gatekeeper, the one who meticulously removed every competitor who dared to approach the queen of his heart.

He remembered a boy named Dave from their freshman year. Dave had been kind, persistent, and had the habit of sending food to the studio. Daniel had destroyed him with a few well-placed, surgical comments.

"Why do you bother?" Daniel had asked Dave, leaning against the doorframe with a bored expression. "Do you think we're beggars? If Caroline pays attention to you, it's purely out of pity. She's too nice to tell you that you're a nuisance."

He had hundreds of strategies like that. He was a shark in the shallow waters of university romance. But now, Karma had arrived in the form of a blue-eyed "alien" from a dimension Daniel couldn't even map. Harrison Marcus didn't play by the rules. He didn't send food; he bought the building. He didn't ask for permission; he demanded fulfillment.

"Shall I just stand here while he takes her?" Daniel's voice was a ragged thing.

The girl who had melted his heart was standing ten steps away, silhouetted against the Havenport skyline. She looked fragile, her shoulders shaking with the weight of her choice. In the stories Daniel read, love was supposed to be selfless. Let me be hurt as long as you are happy, the poets wrote.

But Daniel wasn't a poet tonight. He was a man who had been cheated.

"It's too cruel," he whispered.

He stepped forward, the magnet of her presence drawing him in. He pulled her into his chest, his nose inhaling the scent of her hair-the familiar, grounding smell of vanilla and paper. For a second, the world was silent.

Then came the blow. Caroline's elbow landed sharply in his stomach, a physical reminder of the boundary he had just crossed.

"Ouch..." Daniel groaned, but he didn't let go.

"My feelings are in chaos, Daniel, and you're still trying to play games?" she snapped, pulling away.

"Do I look like I'm joking?"

Daniel's eyes were red, his body trembling with the sheer force of his own vulnerability. He realized this was the critical moment. He was the bomb, and he was finally exploding.

"Daniel... your gaze... it scares me," Caroline said, backing away until she was cornered against the garden's minimalist stone bench.

"Tell me," Daniel begged, stepping into her space. "How can you be happy with this? How can you look me in the eye and say this is what you want?"

"Daniel, stop it. I don't want to joke around. You're scaring me."

"Can I ask for a few seconds of your time, Caroline? For once, look at me. Not as the guy who sleeps in your studio. Look at me."

Caroline held her breath. In the silence of the sky garden, she finally felt it-the awareness she had been suppressing for years. Daniel wasn't just "Damar the poet." He was a man who had been in love with her since the first day they met.

"I've loved you since the first time you woke me up," Daniel said, taking her back to two years ago.

He remembered the lecture hall, the scent of stale coffee, and the way he had been ignoring the professor's drone. He was the "grumpy senior" who slept through every class. But then, a girl with a ponytail had leaned over and whispered: "Hey Daniel, I have an interesting offer for you. Wake up; you won't regret it."

He had woken up to find her smiling at him, a spark of life in a dull room. He had joined her team because she asked, never realizing that the "interesting offer" would eventually cost him his heart.

Caroline's tears finally spilled over. It wasn't just Daniel's confession; it was the entire dam of her life breaking at once. Her dreams, her autonomy, her very heart-none of it belonged to her anymore. She had pawned it all for the Hale family. For Jane's sanity, for her father's health, for her mother's peace.

"Stop it, Daniel," she sobbed, covering her face. "You're making me regret it."

Daniel's heart cracked at the sound. He sank to his knees in front of her, gently pulling her hands away from her face. He used his thumb to wipe the tears from her cheeks, his expression one of profound, agonizing tenderness.

"I can't let you do this to yourself," he whispered.

Caroline took a deep, shuddering breath. "Daniel, I know this is difficult. But I can't give you anything. My life has already been mapped out, and I have decided to walk the path as best as I can. There is no 'us' in this story."

Daniel bowed his head, resting it against her knee like a knight struck by a mortal wound. "Even when you know he's just using you? Even when you know he has another woman sitting in that boutique?"

"It's not that simple, Daniel. This is about saving my family. Harrison... he's in his own cage, too. We're both just fulfilling a contract."

"Can I ask for a little hope, Caroline? Just a shred?"

Caroline shook her head. She had to be the steel. "The marriage will last two years. But even then, I won't give you a chance to wait for me. I won't be that selfish."

"I can wait! Two years is nothing!"

"No, Daniel. I won't let you anchor your life to a ghost. I want you to move on. You're a literary genius; you can make anyone fall in love. You should find someone who can love you back without a contract in the way."

She reached out, touching his shoulder. "Be the friend I need. Don't be the man I can't have."

Daniel looked up at her, his face a mask of resignation. "If I agree to be your friend again... if I promise to stop demanding more... will you give me one thing?"

"What?"

"One day. Give me twenty-four hours of your time as compensation for the 17,520 hours I've spent loving you. One day where we aren't a CEO's project and his 'substitute' bride. Just one day for us."

Caroline hesitated. The logic of her new life told her to say no, to cut him off and protect the Marcus image. But the girl who made paper hearts couldn't do it.

"One day," she agreed softly. "And after that, we go back to the way it was."

"Deal," Daniel said, standing up. He offered her a faint, sad smile. "At least I'll have a memory of my own to keep."

Across town, in the high-tech, black-glass heart of the Marcus Group headquarters, the CEO was not working.

Harrison sat in his darkened office, the glow of three monitors reflecting in his blue eyes. He looked like he was analyzing market trends, but the windows on his screen were filled with low-resolution photos and grainy video clips.

He watched the girl in the ponytail sitting in a fast-food booth with the "Literature guy." He watched them get on a bus. He watched them stand on a rooftop garden.

"What are they talking about?" Harrison muttered, his voice a low growl of frustration.

He was disgusted with himself. He was the CEO of a global conglomerate, a man whose time was valued in millions, and he was spending his evening like a jealous teenager. He rubbed his face, cursing the "Marcus blood" that made him so pathologically possessive of things that were "his."

Every time a new notification appeared from the stalker he had hired, he told himself he wouldn't open it. And every time, his thumb moved of its own accord.

He saw the video of the rooftop. It was too far away to hear the words, but the body language was unmistakable. He saw Daniel kneel. He saw him wipe her tears. And then, he saw the hug.

Harrison's grip tightened on his phone until the screen groaned. He saw Daniel's hand on her hair. He saw the intimacy that he, the fiancé, hadn't even come close to achieving.

"I'm the one paying the bills," Harrison hissed to the empty room. "I'm the one saving her father. And she's crying on his shoulder?"

A surge of irrational, cold fury washed over him. He wasn't just a "partner" in a transaction anymore. He was a competitor. And Harrison Marcus didn't lose.

Daniel walked Caroline to her white picket fence, watching as she slipped inside with the help of the security guard. He waited until the front door closed before he turned toward the main road.

As he walked, his literary instincts-the ones that made him notice the cadence of a sentence or the shadow of a metaphor-began to tingle. He sensed a rhythm behind him that wasn't his own. A car was crawling ten yards back, its headlights dimmed.

Daniel smiled mischievously. He didn't look back. Instead, he quickened his pace, turning into a narrow, dimly lit alleyway. He broke into a sprint, taking off his denim jacket as he ran.

He reached a blind corner and stopped abruptly, flattening himself against the brick wall.

A moment later, a man in a face mask and a dark hoodie rounded the corner, his camera held low.

"Gotcha!" Daniel roared.

He swung his jacket like a net, tangling the man's arms and head in the heavy denim. He tackled the stalker to the ground, the sound of the camera hitting the pavement echoing in the alley.

"Who sent you?" Daniel demanded, pinning the man's wrists. "Give me the camera!"

The stalker struggled, protecting the equipment as if it were a holy relic. Daniel managed to wedge his hand under the man's chest, reaching for the memory card, when the sound of screeching tires filled the alley.

A black sedan-not the Marcus luxury car, but a nondescript muscle car-skidded to a halt. A second man, much larger and more muscular, leaped out. He didn't hesitate. He delivered a sharp, focused kick to Daniel's side, throwing him off the stalker.

Daniel hit the brick wall with a groan, the wind knocked out of him.

The two men scrambled into the car, the doors slamming shut as they sped away, leaving the scent of burning rubber in the air.

Daniel sat up, clutching his ribs. He looked at the empty alley, his heart hammering. They hadn't tried to rob him. They hadn't tried to hurt him more than necessary. They were just protecting the data.

"Blue-eyed bastard," Daniel whispered, a fresh wave of fury rising in his chest. "You're watching her."

He stood up, his gaze fixing on the direction of the Marcus towers.