Lila is summoned again to Damien's office. Their conversation is seductive and sharp, cloaked in metaphor and tension. He probes her, tests her, while she deflects with intellect and defiance. There's danger in the way he looks at her—and something else, too.
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Last moment:
> She looked again at the glass wall across from her. Still black. Still unreadable. But now it felt different. Not like an eye. Like a mouth. Waiting to open.
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The summons came exactly twenty-seven minutes after Rhys left.
It wasn't spoken aloud. No one came. No chime or ring.
Just a single line of text that appeared on the center of her screen, elegant serif font against the white:
Mr. Blackwell will see you now.
No directions.
Just will.
The screen went blank again, as if even those words had been too generous.
Lila stared at it for a beat, then slowly stood. Her pulse thudded low in her chest—not fast. Not yet. But deep. Like the sound of something waking.
She straightened the line of her dress, swiped her palms down her sides, and walked.
Back through the soundless corridor. Past the empty glass offices, the walls that didn't echo. Her heels were the only punctuation.
When the elevator opened for her, she didn't press anything. It already knew where she was going.
The penthouse.
The space that didn't exist on the building directory.
The ride was silent, like the elevator itself was holding its breath.
When the doors opened, she was met with darkness.
Not total.
Just… mood.
Black floors. Tall, shadow-drenched windows. The storm from the night before had not left—it lingered outside like it too wanted a reason to stay.
She stepped in.
No secretary. No assistant. No guards.
The door behind her slid shut with a whisper, locking her into the quiet like a secret.
He was already standing there.
Damien Blackwell.
Facing the skyline, hands clasped behind his back, like a man about to deliver judgment.
She wondered how long he'd been waiting.
He turned when she was halfway into the room.
That face again. Sculpted jaw, restrained expression, eyes so black they could've been carved from obsidian. He didn't smile.
But he did look.
God, he looked.
Like he was memorizing her. Every step. Every angle.
"You wore it," he said softly.
She stopped a few feet from his desk. "You sent it."
His mouth curved slightly. "I offered. You accepted."
Lila lifted her chin. "I never said yes."
"You didn't have to." He circled the desk slowly, stopping in front of her. "The dress said it for you."
She didn't back away. She wanted to. But she didn't.
Instead: "Is that why you brought me up here again? To compliment your own taste?"
"I don't compliment." He said it like a warning. "I observe."
"And what do you observe now?"
Damien stepped a fraction closer. Just enough that she could feel the heat coming off his skin. His voice was low, deliberate.
"You came in the dress I chose, at the time I specified, to a room with no witness but me." A pause. "What do you observe?"
Lila's throat tightened, but she forced herself to meet his gaze. "That you like power. And you expect obedience."
Something flickered across his eyes. Not offense. Not surprise.
Interest.
"Obedience is for people who don't understand strategy," he murmured. "But you're not one of those people, are you?"
She didn't answer.
He gestured to a single black leather chair near the floor-to-ceiling window.
She didn't sit.
He waited.
Eventually, she moved—slowly, carefully—and settled into the seat, folding one leg over the other like armor. The red dress draped around her like liquid sin. Damien returned to his side of the desk but didn't sit.
He just watched.
"What am I doing here?" she asked finally.
"Right now? Sitting across from a man you should fear."
She almost laughed. "Should I?"
"You should." His voice didn't rise. Didn't need to. "But you don't. That's… rare."
Silence stretched between them. Not awkward. Loaded.
Then: "Tell me what you saw when you walked into the room today," he said.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean everything. The lighting. The temperature. The furniture. The spacing of the cubicles. Tell me what it told you."
She narrowed her eyes. "It told me I wasn't meant to feel safe."
A beat.
Then his smile, sharp and brief. "Correct."
"And the mirror?"
He tilted his head, almost admiring her.
"Also correct."
She leaned forward, resting her elbows on the chair's arms.
"You don't like clutter. You like precision. You want people who can read the game without a rulebook. But you also want loyalty. The kind that's earned after they've been watched, tested, maybe even broken."
He didn't interrupt.
"You don't hire designers. You collect them."
Now, he sat.
Not lazily—like a king descending a throne.
"You're more dangerous than you look," he said.
"And you're more obsessed than you pretend."
The air shifted.
He exhaled once, softly. "Do you always say exactly what you think?"
"No," she said. "Only when I know I'm being recorded."
Damien leaned forward, his elbows resting lightly on the desk, fingers steepled.
"You don't belong here."
"Then why did you bring me?"
His eyes flicked over her face.
"I'm still trying to figure that out."
She didn't know if he meant it. That made it worse.
A sudden, strange quiet filled the space. Not empty. Expectant.
Then Damien said, "There was someone before you."
Lila blinked. "What?"
He looked past her for a moment. Out the window. Rain streaked the glass like veins.
"She was brilliant. Brave. Too bright for this place. She lasted three months."
"What happened?"
"She left."
Lila frowned. "You don't sound like that was a good thing."
He turned back to her.
"It wasn't."
His stare pinned her.
"You remind me of her. But not enough to be the same."
That felt like both a compliment and a sentence.
"And what do you want from me?" she asked.
He stood. Walked to the windows.
Rain pooled on the glass like it wanted to fall inside.
"I want to see what you become," he said.
Lila rose slowly.
"And what happens when I become something you don't control?"
Damien turned, very slightly.
And for the first time since she'd met him, his mask cracked.
Only for a second.
But it was enough.
The thing behind the man—the hunger, the damage, the something—peeked through.
"I don't control people, Miss Hart," he said softly.
"I just never let them leave."
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