Elevator to the Penthouse

by Noelle Voss

Heat 4 / 5 · 21+One-Shot2,795 words12m read~19m listen

At 2:17 a.m. in a rain-soaked city corridor of an After Dark suite-hotel, Calliope Ellery has exactly one plan: get out before anyone sees her. She is a publicist who controls narratives for a living, and the last thing she needs is to be caught off-script. Then Nathaniel Morrow steps out of the shadows — cocky, too handsome, and the one rival who has made her career a competitive sport — and a photographer’s flash turns their collision into tomorrow’s headline.

The tabloid wants a story. Their shared investor wants proof of a real, committed couple before sunrise, or both their careers go up in smoke. And the PR shark who leaked the photo is betting they will tear each other apart before they ever pull it together.

Trapped inside Nathaniel’s penthouse suite with the digital lock engaged and nowhere to run, Calliope agrees to the only play left: fake it until dawn. She knows how to sell a love story. She has built them for other people her whole career. What she did not count on is Nathaniel seeing straight through every polished line she feeds him — or the way his eyes soften when she finally stops performing.

Enemies To LoversFake DatingOpposites Attract