Chapter 5
Samuel
Samuel was, once again, the first one in the office.
He arrived while the sky was still a washed-out, predawn grey. The elevator chimed its soft note as he stepped out, entering that hour where the building felt only half-awake; the overhead lights dimmed to their low-energy mode, the open-plan office washed in long shadows.
His monitor greeted him with its usual dark surface. He powered it on, the sudden glow stark against the morning dimness. His fingers moved across the keyboard, pulling up the sprawling merger report that had consumed the last forty-eight hours.
He worked without a break until the sun crested the distant buildings, staining the glass with a pale gold, and people began filtering in.
The atmosphere shifted subtly, transforming from a deep quiet to a gradually building noise; murmured greetings, the hiss of the espresso machine, the tapping of keyboards.
By the time the floor was fully awake, Samuel was already deep into the last section of his analysis. He barely looked up from the screen except to take brief, grounding breaths.
Later that morning, he and Alina stood in the kitchen, waiting for the electric kettle to boil. The room smelled faintly of burnt toast and citrus cleaner. Alina leaned against the stainless-steel counter, stirring her tea with a slow, absent-minded rhythm.
“So,” she said, tilting her head to study him. “How’s the report going?”
Samuel tightened his hands around the warm ceramic of his coffee cup. “Almost done,” he answered, his voice low. “Just need to add a few final citations.”
Alina blinked, her spoon pausing. “Already?” Her voice rose in surprise. “Did you even sleep at all the past two days?”
Samuel’s eyes dropped to a minuscule scratch on the countertop’s surface. “…Not really,” he murmured, the admission soft and slightly sheepish.
She let out a louder laugh this time, the sound warm and incredulous. “Jesus, Samuel… keep this up and you’ll be Wise’s undisputed favorite by the end of the month.”
Before Samuel could formulate a response, a new presence filled the doorway.
George.
Alina straightened slightly and offered a polite, “Morning.”
He answered with a curt nod and moved past them toward the expensive coffee machine, his attention already elsewhere.
Samuel rolled his eyes lightly at her teasing, a small, unguarded gesture that slipped out before he could stop it. She grinned and lifted her mug in a tiny, mock toast.
“Well, good luck finishing the beast,” she said, tapping him lightly on the arm with the back of her hand. “Try not to collapse before you hit ‘send.’”
“Thanks,” he replied quietly, the word barely audible.
And then she was gone; tea in hand, her cheerful energy retreating down the hall and leaving the kitchen’s air noticeably thinner, colder, in her absence.
Samuel reached for his own tea, his fingers curling carefully around it as he turned to head for the doorway.
He’d taken no more than two steps toward the hall before the George blocked his path.
The man stepped forward, his movement effortless, enough to fully occupy the doorway without appearing to make any obvious, aggressive effort.
His expression was a practiced, condescending sneer; his mouth curled at one corner, his eyes cold and assessing, his posture deceptively loose in a way that felt calculated rather than genuinely relaxed.
“What do you think you’re playing at?” George asked.
The tone was quiet, almost conversational, but the predatory edge beneath the words was unmistakable.
Samuel froze. The reaction was instantaneous, a full-system lockdown. His eyes widened as he looked up at the slightly taller man, pure confusion flickering across his face before something colder and more familiar slid beneath it; something tight and instinctive, coiling in his gut.
George wasn’t a large man. They were nearly the same height and build. But the contempt in his sneer, the flat, threatening stillness in his eyes; it was more than enough to send a sharp, warning pulse of alarm straight down Samuel’s spine.
His body responded before his rational mind could catch up.
His shoulders tightened, hiking upward.
His posture curled subtly inward, a protective hunch.
His hands began a fine, persistent tremble around the warm mug.
“Ex… excuse me?” he whispered, the words thin and reedy.
George leaned in a fraction, his voice dropping to a harsh, low register that scraped unpleasantly across Samuel’s raw nerves. “Don’t play dumb with me. You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
Samuel’s throat worked around a dry, difficult swallow. “I… I real… really do not.” The words stuttered out of him, brittle and humiliatingly weak. He hated the sound of it.
He took a half-step sideways, a feeble attempt to slip past the man and into the relative safety of the hallway, but George’s hand shot out with surprising speed and closed around his wrist before he got more than a few inches.
The grip was not outright painful, just tight enough to trap him effectively.
“Keep your little twink ass away from him,” he hissed, the vulgarity a venomous whisper. “Understood?”
Samuel stared at him, the shock of the insult hollowing him out.
His mind scrambled, trying and failing to make sense of what the man was implying.
His stomach dropped like a stone. His pulse kicked into a frantic, hammering rhythm.
The kitchen suddenly felt oppressively small, the walls closing in.
He needed to get out.
Now.
Right now.
Because he could feel it beginning, the old, familiar enemy.
The panic.
The terrifying tightening in his chest, a band of steel around his ribs.
The distant, rising roar starting in his ears.
The way the world began to narrow and tunnel, the edges of his vision darkening.
His fingers shook violently around his mug, the hot liquid inside threatening to slosh over the rim.
“Is there a problem here?”
The voice cut through the charged air of the kitchen like a honed blade.
Goosebumps erupted instantly across Sam’s skin, a cold, primal wave.
He didn’t turn.
He didn’t need to. He knew that voice in his bones.
George’s hand snapped away from his wrist the very second Gael’s voice sliced through the room, the retreat so swift it was almost a recoil.
The transformation on his face was almost grotesque in its speed.
The condescending sneer dissolved into a smooth, blank mask.
The predatory hardness around his eyes smoothed over into something pleasant, deferential, almost friendly.
“Of course not, Mr. Wise,” he said, his tone artificially bright, too cheerful. “Just getting to know the new colleague. Welcoming him to the team.”
The syrupy, false sweetness in his tone made Samuel’s stomach twist into a knot. The mug in his hand trembled with a renewed violence, enough to send a visible ripple shivering across the surface of his tea.
Gael didn’t move from the doorway.
“Go back to your pod,” he said. “Now.”
George nodded quickly, his head bobbing in a series of jerky motions. “Yes, sir. Of course.” He slipped out past Gael’s imposing form, his steps too fast and clipped to be casual, and vanished down the hallway without a backward glance.
A heavy silence dropped into the small kitchen, a physical weight pressing down on everything.
Samuel’s fingers tightened reflexively around his cup.
He could feel the scalding heat bleeding through the ceramic, but his hands still shook with small, uneven tremors he had no hope of controlling.
He knew, rationally, that he should walk away.
His mind repeated the simple instruction like a desperate mantra.
Go. Move. Leave. Now.
But his legs refused the command.
His body was locked in; his shoulders wire-tight, his breath coming in short, ragged pants. His heartbeat thudded in a fast, unsteady rhythm he could feel pounding in his throat, behind his ears, a frantic drumbeat in the very center of his ribs.
He sensed it a moment before it fully landed, a shift in the atmospheric pressure:
Gael’s attention turning its full, undiluted focus toward him.
It felt like stepping directly into the path of a high-powered spotlight; except the light was cold, exacting, a beam that saw straight through skin and bone to the raw, trembling core beneath.
Samuel didn’t lift his head; he didn't need to see to know.
He could feel the intensity of that gaze tracking over him.
It moved down the rigid line of tension corded in his shoulders.
It swept across the uncontrollable twitch in his grip on the mug.
It followed the rapid, shallow rise and fall of his chest.
It noted the subtle collapse of his posture, the way he seemed to be folding in on himself without any conscious intention.
His throat tightened painfully, a band of pure anxiety.
He tried to inhale properly, but the air hit the back of his lungs in useless bursts.
His vision began to edge with a faint, indistinct grey, a haze of panic, adrenaline, and fragmented memory; he couldn’t tell which was which anymore.
His skin prickled with a crawling sensation that screamed at him to flee, to hide, to disappear into the nearest bathroom stall and lock the entire world out.
But his feet were superglued to the spot.
Frozen.
Trapped.
Pinned by nothing more than the immense weight of Gael Wise’s quiet, penetrating stare.
He swallowed again, or tried to; the movement felt jagged and painful.
A muscle in his jaw twitched involuntarily.
His mind kept short-circuiting, repeating the same useless, frantic directive on a loop:
Move. Move. Move. Please, just move.
But his body remained a rigid, disobedient statue.
He wasn’t sure exactly when the chilling thought finally hit him; whether it was a second before or a second after he finally, with a monumental effort, forced his eyes to lift just a fraction, just enough to meet the dark, waiting gaze.
It didn’t matter.
It was already too late.
∞∞∞
15 years before