Tiana Kings didn't look up from her tablet when the door clicked softly behind Emily. The air in her office remained still, polished, and razor-sharp like the woman who inhabited it. The silence stretched, broken only by the faint tapping of her stylus against glass.
Emily stood a few feet inside, holding her own tablet close to her chest like a shield. She wasn't sure if she was meant to speak first, or wait for Tiana to break the ice. With most people, Emily didn't hesitate—but Tiana wasn't most people. She was, in every sense, the boss.
"Interesting man," Emily said cautiously, trying to toe the line between observation and opinion.
Tiana's eyes flicked up, her expression unreadable. "That's one word for him."
Emily edged closer, her voice light. "I meant it in the neutral sense. He's not like the others."
"No," Tiana agreed, her tone clipped. "He doesn't flinch. Doesn't flatter. He's not here to impress anyone."
"That's a good thing… right?"
"It's useful," Tiana replied, tapping her stylus once more before setting it down. "But it doesn't make him trustworthy."
Emily hesitated. "You think he's hiding something?"
"I know he is," Tiana said simply. "Everyone is. The question is whether it interferes with the job."
Emily sat in the guest chair across the desk without being invited—something she wouldn't have dared a year ago. But she'd earned some degree of informal access, even if Tiana never acknowledged it.
"He reminded me of Reuben," she said quietly.
Tiana's jaw tensed almost imperceptibly. Her voice remained even. "Don't say that name like we miss him."
Emily looked down. "I didn't mean it that way. Just… Dylan's got that same intensity. Like he's always watching the exit."
Tiana didn't respond immediately. Her gaze shifted toward the window behind Emily, though she wasn't looking at the skyline. Her mind was elsewhere.
"Reuben was good," she said finally. "Disciplined. Quiet. Loyal, up to the point he wasn't."
Emily winced. "You mean when he—?"
"Got sloppy," Tiana interrupted, voice cool as frost. "Let his feelings cloud his judgment. Started asking questions about my meetings. Started showing up early for no reason. Started acting like he mattered."
Emily didn't say anything.
"I don't pay people to care about me, Emily," Tiana continued, voice low. "I pay them to follow directions. That's the difference between Reuben and Dylan."
"And Dylan won't care?"
"I don't think Dylan knows how to care," she said. "Which makes him perfect."
Emily let that sit in the air a moment. Her eyes softened as she studied the woman across from her. Tiana always spoke like a strategist, like someone who'd already calculated six steps ahead. But sometimes, beneath the armor, there were flickers of something else. Not warmth exactly—but memory. Pain, maybe.
"Do you ever wonder why that is?" Emily asked gently.
Tiana's eyes narrowed slightly. "Why what is?"
"Why someone like Dylan ends up so… closed off. It's not just experience. People like him are made."
Tiana leaned back in her chair, folding her arms. "I don't wonder. It's not my job to fix broken men. It's my job to keep them functional."
Emily looked away, lips pressed in a line. "I know. But still... don't you ever get tired of ice?"
For a moment, Tiana said nothing.
Then, very quietly, she replied, "Ice doesn't shatter. Fire does."
Emily didn't respond right away. She stared at the edge of Tiana's desk, her fingers absentmindedly tracing the corners of her tablet case.
The words hung in the air—"Ice doesn't shatter. Fire does."
She understood what Tiana meant. Fire was passion, vulnerability, loss. Emily had watched Tiana go through assistants, drivers, and associates like she changed heels—sharp, unbothered, and never looking back. But Emily had also seen her late at night, in this same office, staring at her untouched tea, her shoulders tense, her jaw clenched like she was holding back something that didn't belong in boardrooms.
"I don't think Dylan will try to get close," Emily said, choosing her words with care. "He didn't even ask about the pay. Or the hours. Or you."
Tiana raised an eyebrow. "That's either admirable or suspicious."
"Maybe both," Emily admitted. "But I think he just… doesn't care. Not about any of it. He has this look. Like whatever brought him here already burned everything down behind him."
Tiana stood slowly, walking toward the window with her arms folded across her chest. The skyline of the city stretched before her, pristine and uncaring.
"He's not curious," she said. "That's rare."
Emily leaned forward slightly. "You say that like it's a good thing."
"It is. Curiosity leads to familiarity. Familiarity to concern. Concern to complications. And complications kill efficiency."
Emily gave a faint smile. "You ever write poetry in college?"
Tiana didn't turn around. "No. I had internships and a double major."
Of course she did.
"Do you think he's dangerous?" Emily asked after a beat.
"No," Tiana replied. "Not to me. But maybe to himself."
That surprised Emily. Tiana rarely speculated about anyone's interior world. But there it was—an observation, detached but accurate.
"He reminds me of the way Reuben was, in the beginning," Tiana continued. "Collected. Polished. Obedient. But Reuben made one mistake. He thought that proximity meant privilege."
Emily swallowed but didn't argue. She remembered how it had ended—Reuben asking questions that weren't his to ask. Showing up unannounced. Speaking in tones that lingered too long.
"I told him exactly what he was. What he wasn't," Tiana said, her voice low, distant. "And he couldn't handle it. Men like him say they want strong women until one doesn't need them."
Emily's brows drew together. "He cared about you."
Tiana turned, her face blank. "Which is precisely why he failed."
Emily stood up, uncertain whether to push the conversation further. She respected Tiana—admired her, even—but moments like these made her wonder if admiration was enough. There was something lonely about a person so untouchable.
"You know," Emily said, almost to herself, "sometimes it's not a weakness to let people care."
Tiana moved back to her desk and picked up her stylus again. "That's the kind of thinking that gets people replaced, Emily."
The finality in her voice was unmistakable. The meeting was over.
Emily didn't argue. She gave a small nod and turned to go, but paused at the door.
"I'm just saying," she added without looking back, "ice doesn't shatter... but it does melt. Eventually."
Tiana didn't respond.
The door clicked shut behind her.
Later That Night
The office was empty. Long after the staff had gone home, after Emily had texted her a gentle "Good night," after the last of the boardroom lights blinked out across the hallway, Tiana remained at her desk.
Her reflection in the darkened window stared back at her—flawless, poised, untouchable. And yet, beneath the glass, she saw flickers of memory: Reuben's steady voice as he said goodbye, the disappointment in his eyes when she told him he was "crossing a line," and now Dylan—quiet, closed-off Dylan—with eyes that didn't flinch, didn't flicker, didn't reach.
She didn't need another man looking at her like she could be something to him.
She needed someone who disappeared when she didn't need him. Who stayed where she placed him. Who understood that this was a job, not a connection.
And yet, for the first time in months, Tiana didn't immediately return to her spreadsheets. She just sat there, in the dark, her reflection watching her like a stranger.