Chapter 26 The Midpoint Kiss
The press announcement was scheduled for Friday at noon.
Ariella didn’t sleep Thursday night.
She lay in bed staring at her ceiling, not the water stain from home, but smooth, perfect plaster that gave her nothing to focus on, nothing to anchor her spiraling thoughts. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw cameras. Flashing lights. Strangers dissecting her life, her choices, her face. Deciding whether she was pretty enough, young enough, worthy enough to be a Frost.
At midnight, she gave up and grabbed her phone.
“Can’t sleep”, she texted Aiden.
The response came immediately “Me neither. Come over?”
She should have hesitated. Should have thought about boundaries and what it meant that she was spending every night in his room, that his space had become more familiar than her own.
Instead, she got up and walked through the connecting door.
Aiden was sitting on his bed, surrounded by papers and photos. He looked up when she entered, and his face did this thing…relief mixed with something else she couldn’t quite name.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hey.” She climbed onto the bed without asking, sitting cross-legged across from him. “What’s all this?”
“The announcement materials. Patricia sent them over for final approval.” He spread out the photos between them. “We’re supposed to pick which ones go public.”
Ariella’s stomach dropped.
The photos were from a shoot two days ago, something she’d tried to block from her memory. A photographer had spent four hours posing them in various locations around the mansion: the library, the gardens, the conservatory. Touching. Smiling. Pretending to be in love.
It had been torture.
But looking at the photos now, Ariella felt something twist in her chest.
They looked happy.
Not fake-happy, performed-for-the-camera happy. Actually happy. There was one of them in the library, her laughing at something he’d said, his eyes on her face like she was the only person in the world. Another in the garden, his hand on her lower back, her leaning into him, both of them soft and unguarded.
“We look real,” she whispered.
“I know.” Aiden’s voice was strange. “Patricia said these are the ones. Said they tell the right story.”
“What story is that?”
“Young love. Unexpected but genuine. Two people who found each other and decided nothing else mattered.” He paused. “It’s a good lie.”
“Is it a lie?”
The question hung between them.
Aiden looked at her. “I don’t know anymore.”
Ariella’s heart was beating too fast. “Aiden…”
“I know it’s supposed to be fake. I know we’re doing this for practical reasons, my father’s company, your family’s bakery, all of it. But when I’m with you, when we’re just talking or sitting in silence or…” He stopped. Started again. “It doesn’t feel fake. And that’s terrifying because in three months this ends. You leave. I’m left running a company I don’t want. And I’ll have to pretend none of this mattered.”
“Who says it has to end?”
“The contract…”
“Fuck the contract.” The words surprised both of them. “I’m serious. In three months, we can choose what happens next. We can extend it or end it or…” She couldn’t say the next part. Couldn’t say make it real.
“Or what?” Aiden’s voice was barely audible.
“Or figure out what this actually is.”
They stared at each other. The photos scattered between them, evidence of something that was supposed to be performance but felt increasingly like truth.
“I’m scared,” Aiden said finally. “I’m scared of what I’m starting to feel. Because everyone I love leaves. My mom. And eventually you. Everyone leaves.”
“I’m not your mom.”
“I know that.”
“And I’m not leaving right now. I’m here. Right in front of you.”
“For how long?”
“As long as you want me to be.”
The words came out more intense than she meant them. But she couldn’t take them back. Didn’t want to.
Aiden reached out slowly, like she might disappear if he moved too fast. His hand cupped her face, thumb brushing her cheekbone.
“I want you here,” he whispered. “So much it scares me.”
“Me too.”
They were so close now. Close enough that she could see the flecks of silver in his gray eyes, could feel his breath on her face, could count his heartbeats.
“Ariella…”
“Don’t think,” she said. “Just…don’t think for once.”
He kissed her.
It wasn’t like the practiced kisses during the photo shoot…stiff and awkward and performed for strangers. This was desperate and real and tasted like three weeks of tension finally breaking.
His hand slid into her hair. Her hands fisted in his shirt. They kissed like they were drowning and this was air, like they’d been holding back too long and couldn’t anymore, like this was the most honest thing either of them had done since signing that contract.
When they finally broke apart, both breathing hard, Ariella felt like she’d been turned inside out.
“Oh my god,” she whispered.
“Yeah.”
“That was…”
“Real.”
“So real.”
They stared at each other, and Ariella watched as panic crept into Aiden’s expression.
“Wait,” he said, pulling back slightly. “Wait, we shouldn’t…this complicates everything.”
“It was already complicated.”
“But now it’s…” He ran his hands through his hair, making it stick up worse. “Fuck. Ariella, I can’t do this. I can’t let myself fall for you when this whole thing is designed to end. When you’re only here because my father paid you. When…”
“Stop.” She grabbed his hands, stilling them. “Stop spiraling. Nothing has to change. We just…we kissed. People kiss. It doesn’t have to mean anything.”
“Doesn’t it?”
“Not if we don’t let it.”
But they both knew she was lying.
That kiss meant everything.