Chapter 13
S he walks in at exactly eight o’clock.
Which would be acceptable—if she were the client.
But she’s not.
“You’re late,” I say, not looking up from the file I’m reviewing.
There’s a pause. Then the quiet shuffle of her boots as she takes a few more steps inside.
“I thought I was on time,” she says carefully.
“You arrived at eight. My appointments begin at eight. Which means now we’re behind.”
A beat of silence. Then—she takes a subtle breath and lifts her chin. No protest. Just that small flick of her eyes to the ceiling, almost like she’s recalibrating.
A tic of rebellion. A small one but still, I mentally catalog it.
Before I can say anything further, the intercom buzzes.
“Mr. Vale, Jaxon Kane is here for you.”
“Send him in.” I glance at Sienna and nod toward the seating area near the window. “Sit.”
She hesitates for just half a second. Then moves.
Her footsteps are soft on the hardwood, and I note the way she chooses the chair furthest from my desk. Composed. Controlled. But the way she fidgets in the chair before her hands smooth over her skirt before she sits isn’t lost on me.
She’s nervous.
The door opens behind me, and Jaxon strolls in like he’s walking into his mother’s house.
“Took your time,” I say without looking up.
“You try parking in Midtown with a matte black McLaren.”
“Use the valet.” I shake my head. I don’t know why he insists on complaining about the crowd he draws when he drives his flashy cars around town.
Cocky asshole.
He drops into the chair opposite me with a smirk when he cuts his eyes at Sienna with that question lingering in his gaze. One I won’t answer because I’m not introducing her.
She’s not ready to meet someone like Jaxon.
Not until she learns how to sit still.
“How’s the right hook?” Jaxon asks as a stick of spearmint gum disappears into his mouth.
I arch a brow, amused. “Ask your jaw.”
He rolls his eyes and nods to my monitor. It blazes to life when I hit the power button, and Jaxon’s interface takes over the entire display.
“Twelve hours,” he says casually, tapping twice to bring up a wall of code so dense it looks like a foreign language to most. “That’s how long it took me to get into the center of your system.”
I narrow my eyes. “You hacked into The Ledger?”
“Technically? Yeah. But don’t worry. It was just me. A standard hacker?” He leans back, stretches his arms behind his head, his biceps flexing beneath the sleeves of his black henley. “Two to four weeks. Minimum. And that’s assuming they’re good.”
I don’t like that. I don’t like that even a theoretical breach is possible.
Jaxon catches the shift in my expression and grins around his gum. “Told you, you should’ve hired me to build your infrastructure from the beginning.”
“You would’ve been ten years old.”
“Oh, right.” He blinks, then shrugs. “Well, I’m fixing it now. This shit’s child’s play.”
“Lay it out.”
He launches into it without missing a beat. Server vulnerabilities. Contract routing logic gaps. Firewalls with outdated firmware. He pulls up a visual model—my entire empire in blueprint form—and picks it apart with precision.
It’ll cost millions.
That’s not what gives me pause.
It’s the time.
“How long?” I ask, my voice like flint.
He doesn’t answer right away, just flicks another screen up—a projected rollout timeline, months in length.
“I want it locked down today.”
“Hold your horses, O Great and Powerful Ledger Lord,” Jaxon says with a snort, kicking his feet up on the edge of my desk like he doesn’t have a care in the goddamn world.
“You’re asking me to build an entirely new and secure server farm. Not just mirrored backups—but real, deep redundancies. Multiple disaster recovery sites, all with layered encryption and biometric access protocols. We’re talking about locking down every girl, every contract, every client from every direction.”
“And?” I prompt.
He pops his gum. “Give me a month.”
I exhale slowly through my nose, not liking it. Lorenzo hasn’t made a move yet. But it’s coming. I can feel it in my bones. And when he does, he’ll come hard.
Jaxon seems to sense my unease. “It’ll be bulletproof, man. If I’m building it, they won’t even know where to start looking.”
I nod once, then glance toward the corner of the room.
Sienna hasn’t moved.
Her legs are still crossed, her hands folded neatly in her lap. She’s learning when to fade into the background. Not successfully yet, but at least she understands that it's needed—without having to be told.
A promising start.
Jaxon wraps up his updates, grabs his laptop, and mutters a goodbye on his way out. I nod once but keep my eyes on her. She shifts as the door clicks shut. Not much. Just a slight adjustment of her spine.
She’s preparing for what will come next. Likely assuming I’ll launch into some sort of lesson.
The moment stretches and she draws a breath like she’s about to speak.
Though–she doesn’t.
Instead, she clenches her jaw and keeps her eyes on her lap.
She fidgets.
Almost says something another two times while I keep writing notes on my tablet, adding follow ups to my calendar for progress checks with Jaxon.
I set down the pen in my hand and lean back in my chair, fingers steepled beneath my chin. She avoids looking at me as I give her a long inspection up and down. Cataloging her nervous movement and squirming.
“A good Companion knows how to be present,” I say, voice even, “without demanding attention.”
Her eyes finally dart toward me, but she doesn't respond. Not verbally. The twitch in her posture is enough. She’s still expecting more.
She doesn’t understand this yet—what I’m doing.
Sienna came in expecting seduction lessons. Teasing. Flirty smiles in a mirror. That’s what most of them expect.
But that’s not what she needs.
She needs silence. Stillness. Discipline.
She needs to unlearn the things she thinks give her power… so she can learn the things that actually do.
Stillness is strength. Presence is a weapon. And patience? Patience is the most lethal blade in her arsenal.
But she isn’t there yet.
She exhales—just a little too loudly. Her foot taps a few times, before she stops it. Her hands tighten in her lap.
Then, finally she can’t handle the stillness.
“Are we going to begin training soon?”
I don’t look up from my paperwork. “You’ve been in training since the moment you walked in here.”
“I mean… do… something.”
“You’re doing something now.”
I can nearly feel the weight of her eyeroll.
“I’m sitting here like a glorified chair decoration. That’s such a great use of my time.”
Finally I look at her, holding her stare and letting the weight of my attention sink into her.
“It is if that’s what your contract is asking you to do.”
I watch the flicker of frustration in her eyes. The way she squares her shoulders like she’s gearing up for battle. But she says nothing more. Not yet.
“Sit. Be quiet. That’s it.”
She looks away this time staring out the window at nothing.
Another lesson: Not everything requires a response.
The room falls into silence again. I take a few calls. Skim a few reports. Send a few messages. She doesn’t interrupt. But I can feel her presence like a pressure point behind my left eye.
A low growl breaks the stillness of the room as her stomach rumbles.
She freezes like she’s afraid I heard it.
I did.
Her stomach growls again, and she shifts—just slightly—trying to muffle it with her movement. She folds her hands in her lap over and over, likely tensing before her stomach protests her hunger again.
It’s barely eleven. Another hour and a half before the recruits head down for lunch and afternoon training with Eve. She won’t make it that long. And I know she won’t ask.
So I type out a message to my assistant.
A tray arrives minutes later—set quietly on the table in front of her
Diced fruit, soft cheeses, fig and honey jam with crackers, mini strawberry danishes, a carafe of hot coffee, and two bottles of still water.
Sienna looks at it but doesn’t move toward the tray. Doesn’t reach for the food.
Good.
She knows to wait.
I stand, slipping my watch back onto my wrist.
“I’ll be back in thirty minutes,” I tell her, buttoning my jacket.
She blinks up at me.
“Stay here. Help yourself.”
And then I leave—closing the door behind me.
* * *
I didn’t actually have anything that required me to leave the office.
No meetings. No calls that couldn’t wait. No urgent fire to put out.
So I take the elevator down to the fifteenth floor terrace, the one still scented faintly with perfume and cigar smoke from the recent night’s mixer. The space is empty now, but I can still hear the echoes of clinking glasses and forced laughter in my mind.
I pull my phone out of my pocket.
And for thirty minutes, I scroll through Sienna’s Instagram.
She doesn’t post often. A few shots of latte art, a blurry concert photo from last year, a carousel of fall leaves and cozy knits. But there’s a selfie tucked between them—her in oversized sunglasses, hair up in a claw clip, lips puckered around a boba straw. The caption says nothing but a bunny emoji.
Of course.
Looks like the little rabbit has a theme going on.
I tilt the phone and study the image a beat longer than necessary.
Then I lock the screen and head back upstairs.
When I return to the office, Sienna is exactly where I left her.
The tray’s been touched. At least half the food is gone—two crackers stacked on her plate, the fruit rearranged, the coffee carafe mostly full but one of the water bottles nearly empty. The other untouched.
She saved it for me.
I sit across from her and let my gaze linger on the plate.
“You didn’t wait to be served.”
Her eyes widen. Her spine straightens like a wire being pulled taut.
Panic blooms just behind her expression. Her lips part.
“Good,” I say calmly, leaning back in my chair. “You understood the more important rule. You weren’t greedy.”
Her shoulders ease just slightly.
“You were thinking of your contract even when it wasn’t expected. As a Companion, you must always be thinking ahead.”
She nods, a slow, tentative dip of her chin.
I reach for the tray, select a slice of papaya, and spear it with the small silver fork. Her gaze flicks to the movement, just for a second, and then snaps back up as if caught.
I smirk.
“They’ll pay for your attention,” I say, placing the fruit between my teeth. “Your silence. Your presence. If they want noise, they’ll ask for it.”
Another pause.
“Until then, learn how to exist without demanding anything.”
The lesson hangs in the air between us, weighty and exacting.
Sienna nods again. This one firmer. A small effort to regain ground.
I let the silence stretch, my eyebrows raising expectantly.
“Yes.” She affirms.
Then finally, “Yes, sir.”
Good girl.
Finally—calmly—I push my chair back and rise.
“Come back tomorrow.”
She gathers her things, quietly.
My hand wraps around the untouched water bottle she left for me and I head back to my desk.
“And Sienna?” I add, just before she opens the door.
She glances back, her expression neutral but eyes too alert.
“Don’t be late again.”
She nods and slips out the door.
I don’t tell her I’ll be watching but she should know–I always am.