By Monday morning, Roth Industries was abuzz not with innovation, but with intrigue.
The IT floor was still echoing with whispers from the Friday server crash miracle. Liam Carter, the enigmatic technician with the quiet voice and stormy green eyes, had become the most talked-about name in the building.
"He didn't even flinch," whispered Kendra, one of the junior coders, while refilling her coffee in the break room. "The entire server was locked and blinking red, and he just walked up, tapped a few keys, and boom .fixed."
"Total mystery man," added Daniel from product development. "Where'd they even find him? Guy's not in any LinkedIn group or anything."
"He's hot though," someone else murmured with a giggle. "Broody-hot. I swear I saw Elena looking at him like she wanted to eat him alive."
That sparked a new wave of murmurs, this time about the CEO herself. Elena Roth's icy exterior had become legend in the company, and while many respected her brilliance, just as many feared her wrath.
"Maybe he's into older women," one intern joked before receiving a sharp look from Sophie Grant, Elena's best friend and the company's PR director, who happened to be passing by.
"Maybe you'd like to keep your job," Sophie said dryly, arching an auburn eyebrow.
The intern turned bright red and quickly walked away.
Across the building, in the corner office with skyline views, Elena sat behind her desk, staring at her inbox but reading none of it. Her mind was still caught on Liam Carter. Not just his unexpected technical prowess but the way he hadn't looked at her like everyone else did. Not with fear or awe, but with… understanding. It was unsettling.
Sophie entered without knocking, as usual, holding a steaming espresso in each hand.
"You've already had two," Elena said, glancing up.
"These are both for you," Sophie said, setting them down. "One for the stress, one for the rumors."
Elena gave her a dry look. "I assume you're here to tell me what the building's grapevine says."
"Oh, it's rich," Sophie replied, leaning against the window. "Liam Carter has now been cast as either a hacker-turned-saint or a Navy SEAL in disguise. Also, three different departments think you're secretly dating him."
Elena groaned and pinched the bridge of her nose. "It's been three days. I spoke to him once."
"And yet," Sophie said, "you have that exact look on your face you get when you're trying very hard not to be intrigued."
Elena stood and crossed the room to the window, looking out over the city. "He's… efficient. Unbothered. I don't know. There's something off about him."
Sophie smirked. "Off, or interesting?"
"I didn't say that."
"You didn't have to."
There was a long silence. Finally, Elena turned back toward her desk.
"Put out a communication to all department heads. I want a formal review of internal protocols after that server glitch. Quiet, but thorough."
"You're going to dig into his past?"
"I'm going to dig into everyone's past," Elena replied, her voice flat. "Including the man who just saved our entire backend architecture. Because I don't trust miracles."
Sophie's teasing expression vanished at that. "You're still thinking about your father's death."
"I always am."
Down in the tech division, Liam Carter leaned back in his chair and stared at the lines of code on his screen not because they confused him, but because he recognized something deeply familiar: an error signature he remembered creating years ago during his teenage breach of Roth Industries' firewall.
It was still there. Still buried, like a ghost of who he used to be.
He knew the whispers were circling. He could feel the stares. But he didn't care. He wasn't here for them.
He was here for something much more important.
And whether Elena Roth liked it or not, their paths were already entwined.