The call was scheduled for 10AM.
She didn't want to be there, and she made sure everyone knew it.
Oversized sunglasses. Unbrushed hair pulled into a messy knot. The kind of silence that begged someone to ask if she was okay—so she could say no.
The Langford study was too bright. Her father too still. And the board too fake.
The words floated around her: "growth," "portfolio," "strategic alignment."
She sipped her water like it was poison and watched the names on screen flicker by.
But her eyes caught on one.
Vale Holdings.
She tilted her head slightly.
No first name. No voice.
Just a silent square with muted audio.
"Who's Vale Holdings again?" she asked, too casually.
Elias didn't look at her.
"No one important."
Right.
She didn't push. Not here.
Not yet.
***
After the call, she didn't go back to her room.
She went to the piano room.
She couldn't play, but she liked how it sounded when no one was listening. Keys pressed slowly. Soft, dissonant. Like unfinished thoughts.
Jaxon appeared twenty minutes later.
She felt him before she saw him.
"Following me again?" she asked.
"You left the meeting early."
"It was boring."
"It was business."
"Then it wasn't about me."
He paused.
"You sure?"
She looked at him then.
For a long time.
"Tell me something real," she said.
"What kind of real?"
"Anything."
He didn't speak right away.
Then, softly: "I came here for you."
She tilted her head.
"That's vague."
"That's the only kind of truth I can offer, for now."
She played another note.
It rang out—flat, hollow, aching.
Aria tapped another key. Dissonant. Sharp.
Then she stopped.
The silence between them was louder than the notes.
She could feel him behind her—just out of reach. Always a step away. Always waiting for something she wasn't ready to give and he wasn't supposed to want.
She turned on the bench to face him fully.
"You're infuriating, you know that?"
Jaxon didn't flinch. "So I've heard."
She rose slowly. Walked toward him with bare feet and bare intentions, her dress loose, her eyes anything but.
"You watch me like I'm a target," she said. "Or maybe a mirror."
"I watch you," he said quietly, "because I am meant to."
She stopped a foot in front of him.
Close.
But not close enough.
His jaw flexed.
She noticed.
"You said you came here just for me," she said. "So tell me… what is your reason for getting close to me?"
He hesitated.
Just for a second.
And that second told her everything she needed.
"You like me, don't you?" she whispered.
But she didn't step back.
She stepped closer.
There was barely any space between them now. Her breath touched his throat. His hands stayed at his sides like he didn't trust them.
She tilted her head. "Are you scared of me?"
"No," he said. "I'm scared of what I want from you."
That stopped her.
Not because it shocked her.
But because it didn't.
"Say it," she said.
He didn't.
So she leaned in—so close her lips nearly brushed his.
But not quite.
"Say it," she repeated.
He looked at her mouth. Then her eyes.
And then, voice rough: "You."
The word landed like heat.
Her breath caught, and for a second, everything in her—the walls, the pride, the bite—started to flicker.
But she stepped back first.
One slow step.
Then another.
He didn't follow.
She straightened her dress like it mattered, like the fabric could hold her together better than her own spine.
"Next time you want something," she said, voice steady but low, "you better be ready to take it."
Then she left the room.
And didn't close the door behind her.
***
She didn't go far after leaving him.
Just drifted.
Upstairs. Into her room.
She closed the door this time.
Locked it.
Then leaned back against it like her spine needed help holding her up.
Her skin was too hot. Her thoughts too loud.
You.
That one word still echoed inside her chest like it belonged to something bigger—something dangerous.
And his voice… that voice. It wasn't like the others.
It didn't ask. It didn't beg. It didn't pretend.
It confessed.
And she hated that it didn't feel like a line.
It felt like a truth.
She walked to her vanity. Looked at herself in the mirror. Same hair. Same eyes. Same smirk she practiced like armor.
But her mouth was parted. Her breath still off.
She looked kissed.
And that made her furious.
***
Midnight.
The house was quiet, but she wasn't.
She got out of bed. Couldn't sleep.
Too much static.
She wrapped a silk robe around herself, bare legs brushing cool marble, and padded barefoot down the hall like a ghost who couldn't decide what haunted her.
She didn't know where she was going.
Until she did.
***
The garden.
It was cold. Breezy. Moonlight bleeding across the hedges.
She didn't expect him there.
But there he was.
Shirt unbuttoned at the throat. Jacket off. Standing under the same tree she used to climb as a kid when she wanted to scream and no one was allowed to hear.
He didn't hear her footsteps until she was too close to pretend she was just walking by.
They stood there.
Staring.
Something cracked open between them.
Again.
"You're not sleeping," she said.
"Neither are you."
A pause.
"Why are you really here, Jaxon?"
"You already asked me that."
"No," she said. "I asked what you wanted. Now I'm asking why."
His eyes didn't leave hers.
"Because I've never met someone who makes silence feel louder."
Her chest tightened.
She stepped forward.
"Touch me," she whispered.
"I shouldn't."
"I didn't ask what you should."
He hesitated.
Then lifted his hand.
It didn't land on her cheek or her waist.
It brushed her collarbone.
Just once.
Just a graze.
She inhaled sharply.
It felt like static.
Then fire.
"You're dangerous," he said, voice like gravel.
"Then you're in the right place," she replied.
***
They didn't kiss.
But everything in the air around them did.
And when she walked away again—this time slow, deliberate—he didn't follow.
But he watched.
And his hands stayed clenched at his sides long after she was gone.