The Terms of Us
An upmarket M/M fake relationship romance about power, performance, desire, and the contract that becomes more dangerous than either man expected.
The contract was supposed to be temporary.
Wanting him was not part of the terms.
Finn Calloway has a failed restaurant behind him, a catering job under his feet, and no patience for rich men in expensive buildings with sad lobbies.
Declan Marsh has a public scandal to contain, a Senate hearing approaching, and a reputation problem that requires a very specific solution.
A boyfriend.
A public one.
A believable one.
When Declan offers Finn a six-week contract, the terms are clear: appear together, manage the optics, survive the hearing, and walk away clean.
Finn needs the money badly enough to consider it.
Declan needs Finn specifically enough to make that dangerous.
What begins as strategy becomes proximity.
What begins as performance becomes touch.
What begins as a contract becomes the one thing neither man can control.
Because Finn was hired to make Declan look human.
He was not supposed to make him feel that way.
A chef with nothing left to lose. A billionaire who cannot afford to want him.
Finn knows what it means to lose a room.
He built a restaurant once. Trusted the wrong contract. Paid the price. Now he is working catering returns, subletting a room in Astoria, and trying to imagine a future that does not depend on anyone else’s money or permission.
Declan lives in a different kind of pressure.
Committee hearings. Public image. Board politics. Margaux Chen managing the disaster before it becomes permanent. Every sentence measured. Every room calculated. Every vulnerability treated as a liability.
Then Finn walks through the lobby and says exactly what no one else would say.
Declan notices.
That is the beginning of the problem.
The contract gives them rules. The apartment gives them proximity. The public story gives them cover. But the private truth keeps changing the shape of the arrangement until neither man can tell where the performance ends.
And six weeks is long enough to learn that some terms cannot be negotiated once the body has already agreed.
Inside you’ll find:
M/M upmarket romance
fake boyfriend contract
billionaire romance
chef hero
forced proximity
public scandal
power dynamics
high-heat romance
emotional restraint
opposites attract
found intimacy
single-couple trilogy
Perfect for readers who love M/M romance, fake relationship romance, billionaire romance, chef romance, forced proximity, public scandal, emotional restraint, high heat, sharp dialogue, power dynamics, and Kindle Unlimited series where the relationship becomes more real than the contract protecting it.
If you want an upmarket M/M romance where strategy turns into intimacy, performance becomes dangerous, and two men discover that wanting each other is the least manageable part of the deal, start here.
Book One begins with a catering cart in a sad lobby.
And a man powerful enough to buy anything except the answer he actually wants.
Continue The Meridian Series
Book 1: The Terms of Us
The contract was supposed to be temporary. Wanting him was not part of the terms.
Book 2: The Cost of Keeping Him
They chose each other in public. Now the cost has come due.
Book 3: What Love Demands
Love was never the question. Staying is what asks for everything.
Continue with The Cost of Keeping Him
Browse The Meridian Series
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Explore more literary fiction, M/M romance, paranormal romance, sci-fi romance, and emotionally intense stories about intimacy, restraint, desire, and men changed by the cost of being seen.
