I couldn’t look away fast enough, and the sudden eye contact made my pulse jump.
But it seemed like he was just scanning the room; his gaze kept moving almost instantly.
“Regarding this expense report from Marketing…” He spoke quietly, but the room instantly went dead silent.
“I’m going to approve it as a one-time exception.”
Across the table, Erica shot me a smug, mocking little look.
Right after the meeting, Jamison cornered me with a casual smirk.
“Rules are rigid, Katrina, but people don’t have to be. You’re getting too old to be this inflexible. Haven’t you already paid the price for acting like this?”
I clutched my folders tight to my chest and stared him down.
“Mr. Montford, I rejected the request because of the rules. I only approved it because Mr. Hamden made an exception, which is also well within the rules. As the Marketing Director, is that concept really that hard to grasp?”
He scoffed again. “Katrina, when it comes to our relationship-“
“Ms. Perrott.”
A voice cut in from behind me.
Vincent was standing in the middle of the hallway, hands in his pockets, his face an absolute blank.
“My office.”
My whole body instantly went rigid.
Vincent and I sat across from each other in the CEO’s office, a massive desk between us.
“With the new system in place, Finance is taking the brunt of the pressure,” he said. “Disagreements are inevitable during the transition, so tread lightly.”
His tone was flat and direct-pure boss-to-subordinate.
He ran through a few more tasks, pacing his words evenly and laying out his points with clinical logic. He came off as mature and distant, a stark contrast to the young guy I remembered-the one who used to argue with me in that stubborn, playful way.
I felt my anxiety ease a little.
“Understood, Mr. Hamden.”
An assistant walked in to drop off coffee. Vincent looked down, pulled a blue velvet box from his drawer, and slid it across the desk toward me.
I didn’t move.
The assistant offered a polite smile. “Ms. Perrott, it’s a welcome gift from Mr. Hamden for all the department heads. A pen. Everyone else has gotten theirs-you’re the last one.”
Vincent took a sip of his coffee, his long fingers tapping against the box.
“Do you want it?” he asked quietly.
Maybe it was the coffee, but his voice was soft, carrying the warm, damp exhale of his breath.
A deeply familiar shiver ran down my spine.
My mouth went bone-dry as the exact same words from five years ago hit me.
“Do you want it? Ari, do you want me?”
