Chapter 4
RENéE
The elevator doors slid open, and I stepped out, still laughing at Elise’s ridiculous attempt at a British accent.
Ava groaned beside me. “Please, never do that again.”
“No promises,” Elise shot back.
I shook my head, flipping through my phone as we made our way down the hall. Then, like a bad omen, a presence disrupted the air—sharp, unwelcome, grating against my nerves before I even looked up.
Javier.
He was back. He’d been gone for three days, and the office had been unusually peaceful. But good times are short-lived, and there he was, in the lounge leaning into the couch, eyes locked on me from across the room. His gaze was intense, gray like steel, and fixed in a way that felt almost…deliberate. I felt a strange jolt. I glanced back, and he turned away, busying himself with whatever document was in front of him as if he hadn’t been watching me at all.
The nerve. The man wouldn’t even own up to staring.
Back at my desk, I tried to shake it off, I had no intentions or wishes to allow him to occupy even a single second of my thoughts. But the minute I sat down, the memory crept back in. That night at the club, when he’d stepped in with that fire and fury, pulling that guy off me, his face hard and protective in a way I’d never seen. But, in the same breath, he’s managed to ruin the whole moment, he’d snapped back into his arrogant, insufferable self. His eyes looked like that then, too. Sharp, and all-consuming, like he was looking right through me. It was maddening—Javier was maddening. Even when he was silent, he was somehow in my head.
“Get a grip, Renée,” I muttered, flipping open my laptop to drown him out with a mountain of emails. Javier Densmore was nothing more than a distraction I did not need.
Just as I started settling in, a storm of clicking heels and urgency stored to my desk.
“Renée, thank God!” Rose hissed, breathless and urgent. “You need to see this. Now!”
A lot happened in the next ten minutes that followed. I stormed down the hall toward Javier’s office. I barely paused at his secretary’s desk, managing only a quick, “Where’s Mr. Densmore?”
“Inside,” she replied, eyebrows raised as I brushed past.
I didn’t bother knocking. I barged in, and there he was, leaning back in his chair, phone to his ear. He looked up as I entered, those gray eyes narrowing with a hint of curiosity. Without a second’s hesitation, I demanded, “What is the meaning of this?”
Javier held up a finger shutting me down. A nerve in my head ticked.
“I’ll call you later,” he said smoothly, clicking off the phone and setting it down as he stood up.
He looked irritatingly calm. “A good afternoon to you too, Miss Margot.”
“Don’t even start with me,” I snapped, crossing my arms as I fixed him with a glare that could’ve melted glass. “I just found out you halted the entire collaboration on the Devour Project without so much as a heads-up. Do you realize how much time we’ve sunk into this? My team and I have been pulling all-nighters for weeks, and you pull the plug without any warning?”
He raised an eyebrow, feigning surprise. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were blaming me for doing my job. As the Director of Legal Affairs and head of the Acquisitions team, it’s in my best interest to make sure everything aligns with, let’s say, more feasible standards. I didn’t realize our Project Manager needed handholding.”
His words dripped with sarcasm, and that infuriating smirk of his only widened as if my fury was some private form of entertainment. “My team’s work is ground to a halt thanks to your ‘feasible standards’—which, by the way, you could’ve shared without throwing half the project off-track!”
He got off the chair and stopped in front of me. “Funny, I assumed a Project Manager like you would know how to handle a slight roadblock. But maybe that’s too much of an ask?”
“A slight roadblock?” I almost laughed. “You’re either delusional or just plain incompetent if you think undermining weeks of work counts as a ‘slight roadblock.’ But then again, maybe that’s why you’re hiding behind your title instead of doing anything remotely productive.”
His smirk didn’t falter. If anything, he looked pleased, as if my anger was exactly what he’d hoped for. He stepped closer, the air in the room suddenly feeling heavier. “You’re welcome to question my methods, Renée. But maybe if you spent less time whining and more time problem-solving, you’d have found a way around this crisis by now.”
The nerve. I felt my blood pressure spike, and I clenched my fists, holding back a string of words that were far from professional. “Do you honestly think you’re untouchable just because you’ve got ‘Director’ slapped in front of your name? If anything, you’re the one playing catch-up, throwing obstacles at anyone who threatens your fragile little ego.”
He let out a low chuckle, and I hated the way it sounded like he’d won some invisible game. “Funny you think it’s my ego at play here. I wonder—do you always make a habit of blaming others when things go wrong? It’s just… convenient, isn’t it?”
My retort was cut short as he stepped closer, his figure towering over me, his gaze locking onto mine with that intensity I’d seen before. I instinctively took a step back, only to realize I was already backed up against his desk.
My heart was pounding now, but not just from anger. There was a shift in the air, something unspoken, a spark I tried to deny. His face was close enough that I could feel the warmth radiating off him, the faint scent of his damn cologne. It was infuriating, and distracting.
“Careful, Mr. Densmore,” I warned, voice softer but no less sharp, “you’re about one insult away from a formal complaint.”
His smirk softened just slightly, his voice dropping lower. “You wouldn’t dare, sweetheart. ”
The nickname hit me harder than it should’ve, making my pulse skip a beat. It was ridiculous, really. There was nothing swoon-worthy about him. And yet, the way he said it—smooth, confident, like he knew exactly what buttons he was pushing—had me momentarily off-balance, rooted to the spot.
I swallowed, feeling the heat of his gaze, his words settling like a challenge. The air felt thick, a live wire sparking between us, both of us too stubborn to look away, too caught up in the strange, inexplicable pull. We were close, too close, breaths mingling in the tense silence, his hand barely brushing the desk beside me.
And then, as if on cue, the door creaked open, and I heard a startled cough from the doorway.
“Um, sorry—am I interrupting?”
“No, Ms. Margot was just leaving.” Javier’s tone was maddeningly smooth, his gaze flicking back to his desk as he settled into his chair, every bit the picture of calm. Meanwhile, Amy, his poor secretary, stood there wide-eyed, caught in the crossfire, shifting her gaze between us as if she’d walked into some absurdly tense soap opera.
I took a steadying breath, swallowing down the hundred insults still buzzing on my tongue. Without sparing either of them a second glance, I turned on my heel and strode out of his office, heels clicking against the floor in a rhythm that felt like the only control I had left.
Out in the hallway, I forced myself to relax, but Javier’s smirk, his infuriatingly calm voice—it all clung to me like a stubborn shadow.