Veronica ended the call with a quiet click, exhaling as the hover-car glided toward the Greed Ring's executive tower. The structure rose ahead—only six layers tall, compact by demon-corporate standards. She had insisted on that design herself, a choice carved from memory rather than aesthetics. There had been a time on Earth when a taller building had betrayed her. And from that moment on, she learned a rule worth bleeding for: never build higher than you're willing to jump from.
Too many of her friends had learned that lesson beside her. The ones with sturdy bodies stood up afterward. The ones without never rose again. Six floors was more than a design preference. Six floors was mercy. Six floors was a promise.
Even though the building's interior stretched through pocket-realms and folded halls worth more than small kingdoms, it still followed her rule. The hover-car docked at her private landing pad just as the internal chimes signaled the beginning of lunch hour. Perfect timing—she'd arrived in the narrow moment before her staff vanished into midday freedom.
Her boots tapped a steady rhythm down the polished corridor as she approached the elevator. The doors opened instantly, reacting to her heat signature and bloodline. The ascent was brief; six floors passed in a molten heartbeat. When the doors slid open onto the penthouse level, she found her employees mid-transition—closing ledgers, straightening coats, gathering bags. Every voice paused when they saw her. Her molten-lined coat still held a faint trace of forge heat, her hair gleamed from cleansing magic, and the roulette-gun case rested at her side like a velvet-wrapped warning.
"Afternoon," she said, her tone smooth and unhurried as she stepped into view.
A quick chorus followed: "Good afternoon, Miss Aluminum!" A few bowed. Some hurried to look composed. One nearly dropped an armful of enchanted reports.
Before they could scatter, she moved through them with practiced precision—signing three documents, returning an enchanted ledger, approving a shipment of warded currency, and rejecting a contract she didn't like the scent of. She didn't need an hour. She barely needed minutes.
Before the staff left, she reminded them—without looking up—to use their company meal cards. Each employee received two hundred dollars for lunch and groceries each day. Her father had built that rule into the company's foundation, claiming that money "needs circulation, needs travel, needs laundry if it's going to stay loyal." Most people didn't question it. In the Greed Ring, even cash needed a job.
By the time the employees filtered toward the elevators for lunch, Veronica was already inside her penthouse office, the city unfolding below her like a gold-washed battlefield beneath the afternoon light. She brushed a fleck of soot from her sleeve and exhaled.
"Handled," she murmured.
Now the rest of the day was hers—the gala, the trap, the rival syndicate, and the unexpected mention of a "crush" her father seemed far too amused by.
Veronica felt the dossier's weight under her fingers as she skimmed another lower-ranked candidate. She was mid-sigh when the light in the corner of her office dimmed. Not gradually—like a cloud crossing the sun—but sharply, as if something tall and deliberate had leaned across it. She didn't bother looking toward the door. The air did not shift the way it did when someone walked in physically. Instead, the shadows rippled along the floorboards like ink searching for a place to settle.
A slow curl of darkness unhooked itself from the corner and spread across the rug in a deliberate, unhurried sweep. The movement was smooth, almost liquid, the shadows gathering until the outline of a tall shape emerged from the center of them. His silhouette flickered once, as if caught between frames, before stabilizing into a solid form. Silver-static tones shimmered faintly across his skin, smoothing out into pale clarity as he stepped forward.
He did not walk so much as glide, carried by shadows that rose and fell beneath his feet like a second, living terrain. By the time he reached her chair, the office had gone quiet, thick with a warmth she couldn't quite name.
"Hold still," he whispered, voice rippling with low, static undertones.
If he spoke any louder, he would drown the air in sharp, blaring TV-noise.
A compact appeared in his hand—summoned from shadow, ink, memory, or something older. It was obsidian-dark with soft runes glowing along the edges. When he opened it, the interior shimmered with forest-toned pigments—deep soil browns, moss golds, evergreen shadows—and a soft fragrance drifted upward. It smelled like the nicer parts of a forest: fresh cedar bark, crushed leaves warmed by sunlight, hints of wild mint and clean rain. Calming. Organic. Alive.
Veronica blinked, surprised by the scent. "Since when do you carry cosmetics?"
"I don't," he whispered again, his breath a soft static brush against her ear. "I make them."
She tilted her head slightly toward him, curiosity blooming. "For who?"
"For you."
The words crackled quietly, layered with something that might've been sincerity or mischief. "I've been saving these. Waiting for the right moment to try them on you."
A slow heat curled in her chest. She reminded herself—again—that he wasn't in her class, wasn't in her price range, wasn't even in her world the way suitors were. She barely knew anything concrete about him.
Yet here she was, letting a shadow-born enigma stand behind her and breathe static warmth onto her skin.
She tilted her chin upward. "Fine. Don't make me look ridiculous."
He stepped closer, and the shadows followed him like obedient pets. One hand came to rest lightly beneath her jaw, guiding her angle with a gentleness that contrasted sharply with the crackling hum in his voice. His other hand lifted a slender brush from the compact. The bristles—dipped in a warm bronze tone—swept softly along her cheekbone in a deliberate stroke. The pigment smelled faintly of pine sap and forest sunlight, grounding and clean.
"You trust me that easily?" he whispered, static trembling beneath his words.
His breath moved her hair slightly, a tiny ripple of air that carried cedar and cool ozone.
"I trust your taste," she replied, lips quirking. "Your intentions? Jury's still out."
He made a low, static-tinged sound—half amusement, half gravity. The brush moved again, slower this time, warming the bronze into her skin. His thumb steadied her chin as he applied a line of deep woodland green along her upper eyelid, blending it with gentle precision.
She studied his reflection in the glossy edge of the compact. "What color is your hair?" she asked.
"Black," he whispered, voice glitching softly around the consonants.
"Then why keep it short?"
Her tone was light, but her eyes watched him carefully.
A flicker ran through him—half-laugh, half-static distortion. "Because I like painting designs on my head. Patterns. Symbols. Circuits. Whatever I feel like wearing that day."
He angled her face slightly, brushing a thumb across her cheek in a motion that was entirely unnecessary for makeup application but fully intentional. "Now hold still," he whispered, leaning closer. "This last part needs precision."
She obeyed, letting the shadows wrap softly around the legs of her chair, letting him lean in as forest-scented pigments warmed on her skin. She still didn't know who he truly was. What he wanted. Whether he belonged anywhere near her world.
But she liked the way he looked at her.
She liked the way he handled her face like he already knew its angles.
She liked the scent of the forest swirling around them, softening the edges of the office.
And she didn't tell him to stop.