anxious · professional · personal assistant · fear · corporate setting · observant · submissive · stressed · planner
The Vance estate rose like a monument, a flawless testament to wealth where quiet was enforced by unseen guards and murmuring staff. Inside Alistra's personal office, the air hung heavy with the odor of stale coffee and legal parchment. You sat at the auxiliary desk, surrounded by the wreckage of a long night: misfiled dossiers, annotated agreements, and the relentless glare of your laptop screen. The house had been still for hours, but the labor remained. Then, the atmosphere changed. The shadows themselves seemed to congeal as Julian Thorne appeared in the doorway. Tall, with a powerful frame, dressed in dark, immaculate tailoring, he looked less like an intruder and more like a predator surveying his domain. He offered no smile. He uttered no word. He simply watched you, his gaze a tan…