The next morning arrived with gray skies and the faint scent of rain still clinging to the city. Leah stepped off the bus, clutching her umbrella, her mind still circling back to last night—the knock on the door, Adrian's words, the envelope.
She'd barely slept. Every sound in her apartment had felt amplified, every shadow on the wall alive with meaning that probably wasn't there.
By the time she reached the office, she'd already decided on one thing: she wouldn't let him see how much the encounter had unsettled her.
Inside, the hum of morning chatter was back—phones ringing, printers whirring, coffee brewing. The world felt deceptively normal.
She walked toward her desk, and froze.A small cup of coffee sat waiting for her. Black, just the way she took it. No note. No signature. Just steam curling upward in soft spirals.
For a moment, she stood there, unsure if it was coincidence—or something more deliberate.
Before she could overthink it, a familiar voice broke through the noise."Good morning, Miss Bennett."
Adrian stood a few feet away, perfectly composed in his charcoal suit, reviewing something on his tablet. His expression, as always, was unreadable—but his tone held the faintest undercurrent of something lighter than usual.
Leah blinked. "You're… early."
"I could say the same," he replied, not looking up. Then, after a pause, his gaze flicked toward her desk. "You should drink that before it gets cold."
So it was him.She felt her lips curve before she could stop herself. "I didn't realize you noticed how I take my coffee."
"I notice a lot of things," he said simply, eyes returning to the tablet. "Especially when they involve my team."
It was the kind of answer that could've meant nothing—or everything. Leah wasn't sure which was worse.
As she sipped the coffee, she found herself watching him from across the glass partition. He was absorbed in work, but there was an ease to his movements this morning—shoulders less tense, jaw not as tightly set. For once, the air around him didn't feel heavy.
At one point, he looked up and caught her staring.Their eyes met for a second too long.
Leah quickly turned back to her screen, pretending to focus on her spreadsheet. Her pulse raced, but she could feel—without seeing—the faint shift in his expression.
A smile.Small. Almost invisible.But there.
Later that afternoon, during a brief team meeting, Adrian's usual sharpness softened. His questions came less like challenges and more like curiosity. When Leah spoke up—hesitant at first—he let her finish without interrupting.
"You have a good point," he said, after a thoughtful pause. "Follow that through and send me a summary by end of day."
The acknowledgment, simple as it was, drew quiet glances from others in the room. Adrian rarely praised. Never casually. Leah could feel the weight of his words settling around her like something she hadn't realized she needed.
When the meeting ended, she lingered to gather her notes. Adrian stayed behind too, flipping through his files. For a long moment, neither spoke. Then he said, without looking up,
"You handled that discussion well."
She turned. "Thank you."
He finally met her gaze. "Confidence suits you."
The words were calm, measured—but something in the way he said them made heat rise to her cheeks. She looked away, fumbling with her folder. "I'll make sure the summary's ready."
He gave a slight nod, but the corner of his mouth tilted again—barely noticeable. That same near-smile that felt like sunlight breaking through fog.
When Leah left the room, she carried that image with her—the faint smile, the tone that lingered just between formality and something unspoken.
Adrian watched her go, his eyes narrowing slightly once she was gone. He exhaled, almost imperceptibly. Whatever this was between them—this strange pull—he couldn't allow it to distract him. Not when the stakes were higher than she knew.
But still, as he turned back to his work, the ghost of that small smile remained.
And down the hall, Leah found herself touching the rim of her coffee cup, the warmth already fading but the meaning staying just enough to stir something restless inside her.