2025-09-28 01:55:57
Previous Chapter
Latest Chapter
CHAPTER 115 — When Fear Doesn’t Land
Victor Hale doesn’t like uncertainty.He tolerates risk. He understands volatility. He even respects opposition, when it behaves predictably. But this—this quiet resistance, this refusal to fracture—irritates him in a way he hasn’t felt in years.The room overlooking the city is filled with glass, steel, and expensive restraint. Hale stands at the window, hands clasped behind his back, watching traffic bleed through the streets below like veins carrying something vital away from him.“Well?” he asks without turning.Across the table, Marcus Levin clears his throat. “No response. Not publicly. Not privately.”Hale’s jaw tightens. “That’s impossible. People always respond.”“Apparently not this time,” Marcus says. “No distancing. No visible panic. If anything…” He hesitates.“If anything, what?” Hale snaps.“If anything, Locke’s position looks firmer.”That earns him a slow turn.Hale’s eyes are cold, sharp, offended by the idea. “Explain.”“The complaint stalled,” Marcus continues. “HR
CHAPTER 114— The First Crack in the Wall
All afternoon, I feel the shift.It’s subtle at first—like the air in the building has been replaced with something heavier, something charged. People move differently. They speak in tighter tones. Every conversation feels like it belongs to someone else, someone watching from behind a tinted glass pane.By three o’clock, I know something new has happened.Something bigger.Something orchestrated.I see the signs in their faces—tight smiles, forced neutrality, an edge of curiosity sharpened into judgment.Then the notifications start appearing on phones.Not loud.Not shouted.But passed from one desk to another in the form of raised eyebrows, quiet whispers, and too-long stares in my direction.Something is circulating.And it’s about us.My stomach knots, but I force myself to keep typing, pretending I don’t feel the tension crawling across the office like electricity.A message pops onto my screen.Are you in your office?Him.My pulse quickens. I glance around—everyone seems preoc
CHAPTER 113— The Rumors That Spread Like Fire
By midday, I know the man from the parking lot has started talking.People don’t confront me directly—they’re too subtle for that—but the signs are everywhere. Conversations pause when I walk into a room. Side glances linger too long. A few people soften their tone with me, which is somehow worse, like they’ve already decided I’m fragile or compromised or both.And I know exactly whose name is being whispered beneath all the speculation.His.The weight of that hits harder than it should.I try to focus on work—on numbers, schedules, documents—but every few seconds my brain drifts, wondering where he is, who he’s speaking to, what he’s hearing. And whether he’s about to explode at someone and make everything a thousand times worse.By early afternoon, my nerves are shot.I force myself to leave my desk and walk toward the break room, thinking a cup of tea might steady me. Halfway there, voices drift around the corner—low, conspiratorial, just loud enough for my tired brain to latch on
CHAPTER 112— The Moment He Knows Something’s Wrong
I barely sleep.Every time I drift off, I jolt awake with the same looping image—the man in the parking lot, his voice low, his eyes sharp, his warning curled like a snake around my throat.Being close to him has consequences.By morning, exhaustion sits behind my eyes like bruises, and my stomach twists at every small sound. I tell myself not to overreact. He didn’t threaten me, not directly. He didn’t say anything explicit.But something about the way he looked at me…He knew.Maybe not everything, but enough.And if he talks—No.I can’t think about that.When I step into the building, the familiar hum of conversation feels louder than usual, like people whisper the second I pass. Maybe it’s in my head. Maybe it’s not.Either way, I keep walking, shoulders stiff, heart pounding a little too close to panic.I make it halfway down the hallway before I see him.He’s standing near my office door, talking to someone. Or pretending to. Because the second his eyes lift and find mine, the
NEXT CHAPTER 111 — The Line I Keep Crossing
I don’t see him for the rest of the evening.Which should help.It should let me breathe, let my thoughts settle, let my heart return to something close to normal rhythm.It doesn’t.Every quiet moment becomes an echo of his voice.Every empty hallway feels like the shadow of where he stood.Every time I close my eyes, I hear the words I wasn’t ready to hear:You let me stay close.I wish he didn’t know me that well.I wish he wasn’t right.When the sun slips under the horizon and the last workers filter out of the building, I’m still at my desk—pretending productivity, failing miserably. Eventually I give up and push away from the chair, my body stiff, my mind exhausted.The air outside is cool, sharp with sea salt. The kind of air that should clear my head. Instead, the breeze just carries the ghost of his cologne, or maybe I’m imagining it. Maybe he’s under my skin now, and everything smells like him.The thought makes my stomach twist.I’m halfway across the parking lot when I see
NEXT CHAPTER 110 — The Distance I Can’t Keep
I spend the rest of the day pretending the hallway didn’t happen.Pretending his voice isn’t still in my head.Pretending my pulse isn’t still tangled in the memory of how close he stood.Pretending I don’t replay every word he said—especially the ones whispered too softly to forget.Then let me stay until you’re not scared.It digs into me in ways I can’t afford.I tell myself to work. Focus. Move. Keep busy. It lasts maybe five minutes before my thoughts wander to him again, like a stubborn compass that refuses to point anywhere else.I hate that he does this to me.I hate that I let him.By late afternoon, the sky hangs low and grey over the shoreline, and the smell of the ocean slips in through every open window. I’m at my desk, staring at a stack of reports that should matter more than the sound of one man’s footsteps echoing through my skull.Footsteps I swear I can still hear.Until I actually do.A quiet knock at my half-open office door makes my head snap up. And just like th
You may also like
