The rain hadn't stopped. It turned the city into a film of shifting reflections, headlights bleeding across wet asphalt. Leah stood by the hostel window, watching the traffic thread through the dark, the badge from Voss Group still lying on the desk beside her.
Sleep refused to come. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw him — the man who spoke in orders instead of sentences, who decided her future in under three minutes.
Adrian Voss.
Even his name felt like a locked room.
She replayed the interview again, trying to understand what he had seen in her. Nothing special, surely. Just another desperate applicant. Yet something in his gaze had paused — a flicker of memory, like he almost recognized her.
She shook it off. Wishful thinking. People like him didn't see people like her.
By dawn, the storm had thinned to drizzle. Leah dressed carefully — a plain blouse, charcoal skirt, no jewelry. Her shoes were still damp. On the bus to Voss Tower, she clutched her folder tight enough that the corners bent. Every bump on the road felt like a question she couldn't answer: Can you keep up? Can you survive?
Adrian Voss watched the rain crawl down his office glass. Forty-eighth floor, too high for the noise of traffic, too detached for sleep. The city looked obedient from here.
He had reviewed hundreds of applicants that month — none memorable. Yet the woman from yesterday wouldn't leave his thoughts. Leah Morgan. There was something about the way she held her silence — not submission, not fear. Control.
It unsettled him.
He'd learned to read people in seconds; it was how he built the company. But her stillness had thrown his calibration off. And that name… Morgan. He'd heard it once, long ago, tied to a night he preferred not to remember — a storm, a rescue, a debt unpaid.
He exhaled and turned back to the screen. He didn't have time for ghosts.
By nine a.m., Leah was at her assigned desk on the nineteenth floor — temporary placement, no cubicle yet. A digital clock blinked above the glass partition. The hum of keyboards filled the room like static.
"Leah Morgan?"
She looked up. A woman in her thirties, sharp eyeliner, sharper tone. "I'm Kara Levine, senior executive assistant. You report to me until Mr. Voss says otherwise."
"Yes, ma'am."
Kara scanned her once, unimpressed. "Rules are simple. Accuracy over speed. No assumptions. If you need clarity, you ask once. Not twice. Don't waste his time."
Leah nodded.
"And don't talk to him unless he talks first. Understood?"
"Yes."
Kara's expression didn't soften. "Good. You'll draft transcription notes for the quarterly reports. His schedule's in flux, so stay reachable after hours."
Leah bit back the urge to ask reachable how. The warning in Kara's tone made it clear: adapt or disappear.
The rest of the day blurred into numbers, files, and endless formatting. Leah worked until her shoulders ached, until the city outside turned gold with evening. When she finally glanced at the time, it was past eight. Everyone else had gone home.
She gathered her things, then paused. The light under Mr. Voss's office door was still on.
Her heart thudded. Logic told her to leave. Curiosity told her to knock.
Curiosity won.
She tapped once.
"Come in," his voice said.
The office was half-dark, lit only by the city below. He didn't look up from the screen. "Report ready?"
"Yes, sir." She crossed the room, laid the file on his desk. Her fingers brushed the polished surface — cold, immaculate.
He finally looked at her.
"First day?"
"Yes."
"Still here at this hour?"
"I wanted to finish the report properly."
He studied her for a moment that felt longer than it was. "You don't have to prove yourself by working past exhaustion."
Her lips curved, faint. "Then how would you know if I could keep up?"
That made him look up, fully. His eyes — the same quiet steel — held her for a beat too long. Then he leaned back, something unreadable crossing his face.
"You shouldn't challenge your employer, Ms. Morgan."
"Was that a challenge, sir?"
Silence. Then — very faintly — the corner of his mouth twitched. "You can go."
She nodded, turning toward the door.
"Leah."
She froze. He rarely used first names.
His tone softened just slightly. "Good work today."
Her breath hitched. "Thank you, Mr. Voss."
She left before he could see the heat rising to her cheeks.
When the elevator doors closed behind her, Adrian leaned back in his chair. The rain started again, tracing silver lines across the glass.
He hadn't meant to say her name.
It had just… slipped.
Below, the city pulsed — a network of lights and hidden debts. He told himself it meant nothing. She was just another employee, another variable in a system he controlled.
But when he closed his eyes, he saw her standing in the rain, the reflection of the city in her eyes — and something inside him shifted, almost painfully.
No distractions, he told himself. Not again.
Yet even he knew: some ghosts don't stay buried when the storm returns.