Novels by Ar_key

Chapter 10: Project ScapegoatThe steam from the bathroom followed her out, a humid ghost that clung to the edges of the room. Clarisse stood there, a vision of domestic softness in her white robe, two steaming mugs of coffee in her hands. The smile on her face was something Daffa had started to believe in—a rare, unguarded expression that made him think he’d finally found the woman beneath the ice.Then she saw the tablet in his hand.The smile didn't just fade; it died. It was a slow-motion collapse of every muscle in her face until she was back to the version of Clarisse Bautista he had met in the elevator: cold, calculated, and perfectly unreachable."Clarisse," Daffa repeated, his voice sounding hollow, like a bell rung in a vacuum. "I’m going to ask you one more time. What is Phase 2?"Clarisse didn’t move. She didn't drop the mugs. She didn't even blink. "Daffa, put the tablet down. We can talk about this.""Talk?" Daffa let out a jagged, breathless laugh. He turned the screen

Chapter 9: Breaking the Non-Disclosure AgreementThe morning light didn’t just peek through the curtains; it flooded the cabin with a soft, golden warmth that felt entirely too peaceful for a man who had spent the last year living in a state of constant tactical anxiety. Daffa shifted, the heavy wool blankets rustling against his skin. The cold was gone, replaced by the radiating heat of the woman currently using his chest as a pillow.He didn’t move. He didn’t even want to breathe too loudly. For the first time since the elevator, the world felt quiet."I can hear your brain whirring, Daffa. It’s ruining the vibe," Clarisse murmured, her voice thick with sleep. She didn’t pull away; instead, she tightened her arm across his waist.Daffa smiled, staring up at the timber ceiling. "Is my brain really that loud? I thought I was being incredibly zen.""You have a 'thinking' heartbeat," she said, finally lifting her head. Her obsidian hair was a chaotic mess, her eyes were slightly puffy,

Chapter 8: The Mandatory Romantic RetreatThe drive up to the Puncak highlands was an exercise in suffocating silence. Clarisse stared out the window at the passing pine trees, her hand still shoved deep into the pocket where she had hidden the crumpled note. Daffa watched the reflection of her face in the glass—pale, rigid, and completely detached.“You’re going to burn a hole in that pocket if you keep clutching that note, Clarisse,” Daffa said, his voice cutting through the hum of the car’s engine.“I told you, Daffa. It’s a prank. Drop it,” she replied without turning around.“Pranks don’t come on vellum with your family’s private crest. And pranks don’t make you look like you’re waiting for a firing squad.”Clarisse finally looked at him, her eyes sharp. “We’re here to sell a romance to the board’s weekend retreat, not to play detective. Can you focus on the job?”“The job just involved me smashing a tablet over Julian’s head and dodging a blackmail attempt,” Daffa countered, pul

Chapter 7: Protective InstinctsThe silence in the executive suite didn’t just linger; it suffocated. Clarisse looked like she had seen a ghost, her hand still hovering over the laptop screen as if she could erase the image by sheer force of will.“Daffa,” she whispered, her voice barely audible. “If my father sees this… it’s not just my career. He’ll destroy you. Literally. You don’t know what he’s capable of when he feels his ‘legacy’ is being mocked.”Daffa wasn’t listening. He was already leaning over her desk, his eyes darting across the metadata of the email. “Don’t panic. If you panic, we’ve already lost. Give me your admin token. Now.”“What? Why?”“The email came from an encrypted relay, but the timestamp on the attachment is off by four minutes from the actual archive log,” Daffa muttered, his fingers flying across the keys of her laptop. “That means it wasn't a live capture. They downloaded the raw footage from the cloud backup first, edited the clip, and then sent the scre

Chapter 6: The Water Cooler ConspiracyThe red light of the security camera felt like a laser burning through Daffa’s skull. His hand, which only seconds ago had been exploring the curve of a Vice President’s thigh, now felt heavy and numb. He slowly stepped back, his shoes clicking against the concrete floor with a sound that felt like a gavel striking.“Clarisse,” Daffa whispered, his voice cracking. “How fast does that footage upload to the server?”Clarisse was frantically pulling her hair into a semblance of a ponytail, her fingers shaking so violently she dropped her silk tie. “Real-time. It’s a closed-circuit loop, but the cloud backup triggers every five minutes.”“Five minutes?” Daffa looked at the camera, then at his watch. “We’ve been in here for... oh God, we’ve been in here for forty minutes.”“Stop talking,” she hissed, finally smoothing her skirt. Her face was a mask of pure, unadulterated panic, the ‘Ice Queen’ facade shattered into a million jagged pieces. “Go back to

Chapter 5: Dark Rooms and OvertimeDaffa stared at the closed door of Clarisse’s bedroom, the click of the latch echoing in the silent penthouse like a final verdict. His heart was still trying to escape his ribcage, his lips still tingling from the weight of a kiss that had definitely lasted seven seconds too long for a "performance."“Adrenaline,” he whispered to the empty foyer, his voice sounding like sandpaper. “Just a heavy dose of professional commitment. Nothing more.”He turned toward his own room, but his eyes caught his reflection in the floor-to-ceiling windows. He didn’t look like a lead analyst. He looked like a man who had just touched a high-voltage wire and was secretly wondering when he could do it again.*“I need you to stop staring at the coffee machine and start staring at these files, Daffa. We don’t have much time.”It was three days later. The tension from the gala hadn't dissipated; it had just curdled into a thick, awkward professionalism that made the air i