12. Cloe
CLOE
I didn’t sleep.
Not really.
I left Wolfe’s bed just before dawn—legs sore, throat raw, skin aching in places no one had touched. I dressed in silence. Didn’t look at him. Couldn’t. Because if I had… I might’ve begged.
He let me go.
I think that hurt more than if he hadn’t.
I walked home barefoot. The heels didn’t make it through the hallway. The city felt colder than usual. Or maybe I did.
By the time I got inside, my body felt hollow.
I stripped in the dark. Stood under the shower until the water went cold. Sat on the edge of the tub with my knees pulled to my chest.
I couldn’t cry.
I didn’t have it in me.
But the ache between my thighs wouldn’t fade.
And the message he’d sent still echoed in my bones :
Next time—I’ll leave fingerprints where he was never allowed to look.
I wore my hair up.
Tight twist. Not a curl out of place. No ribbon this time. No softness. Just clean lines and an exposed neck and the ache of self-control threading through every strand I pinned into place.
My makeup was minimal.
No foundation. No blush.
Just bare lips and mascara thick at the corners to make my eyes seem harder than they were.
The dress was simple. Black. Sleeveless. Ribbed knit that clung to my body in silence. The neckline kissed my collarbones, and the slit up my left thigh wasn’t obscene… but it was intentional.
No bra. No jewelry. Just a pair of red-bottom stilettos—loaned from Camille’s collection and never returned—that made every step sound like a countdown.
The office noticed.
They always did.
Not with gasps or wide-eyed stares. No, the Lawlor floor didn’t give attention freely.
But I saw the way two assistants paused in their conversation when I passed the espresso station.
Heard the scrape of a chair shifting behind me when I walked through the bullpen.
Felt the eyes on the back of my neck, right where Barron had told me to leave exposed.
I kept my chin up.
I moved like the floor was mine.
Even if my stomach was tying itself into knots beneath the corset I hadn’t worn today. Even if my fingers still ached from gripping the safe door two nights ago. Even if my dreams kept ending with Wolfe whispering say thank you while my knees hit something cold and unrelenting.
The moment I stepped onto the executive floor, I felt it.
Them .
Their energy.
The air shifted, like the building had braced itself.
The receptionist—perfect, polished, always unimpressed—didn’t ask me where I was going. She just gave a single nod.
“They’re waiting for you in conference two.”
Waiting.
For me.
Not to scold. Not to humiliate.
To see.
To test.
To tighten the leash they claimed wasn’t there but wrapped around my throat all the same.
I walked.
My heels echoed.
Every step louder than I intended. But I didn’t slow.
The door was already cracked open when I reached it. I pushed it wide.
And there they were.
Four brothers. Four chairs. One empty seat.
No one spoke.
Not at first.
Then Royal smiled without teeth and tapped the armrest beside him.
“C’mon, sweetheart. Don’t make us beg.”
The door clicked shut behind me.
Silence settled.
Not the polite kind. Not professional.
The kind of silence that wrapped around your ankles like rope and tugged .
The four of them were already seated.
Barron at the head of the table, suit pristine, phone face-down beside his leather portfolio.
Wolfe across from him, black shirt rolled at the sleeves, fingers steepled as if prayer was ever something he practiced.
Loyal, quiet and focused, tapping something into a notepad.
Royal—of course—was leaned back, legs spread, arm resting along the chair beside him.
My chair.
He didn’t look at me. Not at first. Just kept swirling something in his glass like this was a social call.
“We were starting to think you’d gotten lost,” he said without looking up.
“I was sent to the wrong room,” I lied.
Wolfe’s eyes flicked to mine. Sharp. Fast.
He didn’t say a word.
Barron didn’t motion for me to sit.
But Royal did.
A slow tap of two fingers against the seat beside him.
“Come on, sweetheart. Don’t leave me all alone over here.”
I walked.
Not quickly.
Not carefully.
Just… deliberately.
My heels clicked once, twice, three times before I reached the chair and sat.
Royal’s arm didn’t move. It stayed on the back of my chair, just close enough that when I settled in, his fingers brushed my shoulder.
Barely a touch.
But enough to set my skin on fire.
Loyal slid a folder across the table toward me.
“Barron wants you to review this while we go over the Gotham acquisition. See what stands out. ”
I nodded, opening it.
Spreadsheets. Share allocations. Something about conflict zones and rare stone procurement.
I blinked and tried to focus. But the room was too warm.
Or maybe I was.
Barron began speaking—his voice low, direct, commanding.
He didn’t look at me.
Didn’t address me.
But every time he said words like control or ownership or pressure, I felt them settle in my gut like they weren’t part of a corporate conversation at all.
Wolfe never turned his head. But I felt his gaze sweep over me again every time I shifted.
Royal leaned in once, murmured under his breath:
“Bet you’re wet under all that elegance.”
I didn’t react.
I didn’t even blink.
But my thighs pressed together beneath the table, and I hated myself for how right he probably was.
Thirty minutes passed in quiet strategy talk.
I kept my eyes on the pages. Made notes when I could. Traced numbers I didn’t fully understand. Tried to stay small.
Until Barron stopped speaking mid-sentence.
His eyes shifted to the screen. Then to Loyal.
Then, finally, to me.
“There’s a flaw in this.”
Everyone paused.
Even Royal’s fingers stopped their lazy glide along the table beside my hand.
Wolfe’s head turned—slow and silent—to face me fully.
“You’ve been reading,” Barron said. “Say something useful.”
It wasn’t a question .
It was a command.
I swallowed.
Let the silence draw for a second longer.
Then I turned the page.
“Page six, third line. The listed supplier in Myanmar was exposed in a procurement scandal last year. The public fallout didn’t last long, but it was enough to tank their perceived legitimacy. We’ll be accused of compromising ethics if we don’t reroute the acquisition chain now.”
Silence.
Then Loyal said, quietly, “She’s right.”
Wolfe didn’t blink.
Barron stared at me for three long seconds.
Then said, flatly:
“Noted.”
That was it.
No thank you. No praise.
But I felt Royal’s knee shift under the table. His leg brushed mine.
“Sharp little thing, aren’t you?” he murmured, just for me. “No wonder they keep dressing you up.”
I held my tongue.
But something in me twisted.
Something tightened.
And it wasn’t fear.
The meeting ended like all their meetings did—with silence and steel.
No “thank you.”
No acknowledgment that I’d contributed anything of value.
The brothers stood, gathering papers, checking phones, snapping suit jackets back into place like armor.
I stayed seated.
Because I hadn’t been dismissed .
And because I didn’t trust my legs to hold.
Royal left first. He winked at me on his way out, then leaned in close enough to brush my ear with his breath.
“Try not to drip on the chair, sweetheart.”
I didn’t look at him.
Didn’t flinch.
But the burn that followed spread like wildfire down my spine.
Wolfe didn’t speak. Didn’t look at me again.
Loyal nodded once. His only tell was the way he lingered by the door for a second longer than he had to.
Then it was just me.
And Barron.
He closed the door softly behind his brothers.
The sound echoed in the conference room like a gunshot.
I sat still. Back straight. Hands folded in my lap. Trying not to breathe too loudly. Trying not to hope.
He moved slowly, circling the table.
Not fast. Not stalking.
Measured .
Like a man who’d already decided what to do.
I felt him behind me before I saw him. The warmth of him. The weight.
Then—
A single fingertip.
Not on my skin.
On the twist of hair at the back of my neck.
The exact spot he’d told me to leave exposed.
He didn’t press. Didn’t stroke. Just touched. Barely.
“You wore your hair up.”
I didn’t answer.
Couldn’t .
My pulse was too loud in my ears. My breath too shallow to trust.
His voice dropped. Low. Silken. Possessive.
“Good girl.”
I almost came apart at the spine.
It wasn’t what he said.
It was the way he said it.
Not soft.
Not sweet.
Like an acknowledgment. Like ownership. Like a man who had given an order and found it obeyed.
He stepped away a second later, already turning toward the door.
“Next meeting’s at three. Be early.”
That was it.
That was all.
He left me there in that chair with a soaked lace thong, a shaking ribcage, and the impossible knowledge that I would do anything to hear him say it again.
The air changed before she even spoke.
The kind of shift that doesn’t announce itself—but demands attention. It started with the sound of heels. Not rushed. Not timid. Measured.
Controlled.
Like the woman walking toward us didn’t just know who she was—she knew who everyone else wished they were.
Selene Lawlor.
She stepped through the main office like she still owned it.
Like the company wasn’t in her ex-husband’s name, but still pulsing in her blood.
Her dress was white.
Of course it was.
Sharp-shouldered, perfectly tailored, cinched at the waist like she knew the damage it did. Her heels were nude. Expensive. Her lipstick? Red.
Not smeared.
Not soft.
Weaponized.
I froze before I even saw her eyes.
And then—she looked at me.
Like I was dirt tracked in on her marble floor.
A single, searing glance.
Up. Down. Done .
My stomach twisted.
I didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Didn’t exist in her world. I was a shadow in her palace.
The office went silent.
Even the assistants fell quiet, backs straighter, posture sharpened.
And the brothers?
They stepped out of their offices one by one.
Loyal went still.
Royal smirked—but it didn’t reach his eyes.
Wolfe? He crossed his arms and leaned back like he was watching something he didn’t want to want.
And Barron?—
God.
Barron looked at her like he’d been shot.
Just for a second.
Just one fucking second.
Then he blinked.
His face closed.
And the man who’d just called me good girl vanished behind polished stone and steel.
Selene smiled .
Not at him.
At everyone else.
Like she already knew she’d won.
“I was in the neighborhood,” she said, her voice velvet and viper. “Thought I’d say hello.”
No one stopped her. Not even Barron.
He just watched.
Like a man looking at the edge of a cliff he once jumped off, knowing exactly how the fall would feel—but still aching to taste the air again.
She didn’t stay long.
Ten minutes, maybe less.
And when she left?
She kissed Loyal’s cheek. Winked at Royal. Said nothing to Wolfe.
And she passed Barron like he was nothing.
But after she was gone…
He didn’t move.
Didn’t speak.
Just turned.
Stepped back into his office.
And gripped the edge of his desk so hard his knuckles went white.
I watched from across the floor.
Unseen.
And it gutted me.
Because the most dangerous thing about Barron Lawlor?
Wasn’t his silence.
It was how much he still felt—even when he was trying not to.
I didn’t notice the envelope right away.
Not until I returned to my desk, still rattled from the echo of Barron’s silence. The office air felt thinner, colder—like it remembered Selene’s scent more than mine.
It was there.
Waiting.
Pale, expensive paper.
My name scrawled in red ink that looked more like it had been carved than written.
No return address.
No logo.
Just inevitability.
Inside: a single photo.
The black book.
Small. Leather-bound. Wedged against a stack of sealed files inside a safe I’d only seen opened once. Barron’s safe.
The note was printed in smooth, feminine handwriting:
He still keeps secrets. But you’re the only one close enough to open the lock. You want peace, Cloe? You know what you need to do.
I stared at it for too long.
Long enough for my stomach to knot.
Long enough for the silence in the office to settle into my spine like a second skin.
I took it home.
I shouldn’t have. But I did.
Because I didn’t want anyone else to see it.
Because I didn’t want to admit that I already knew what the code might be.
Because Camille’s birthday was seared into me like a scar.
It was late when I finally poured the wine.
Too late for visitors.
Too late for thinking.
Just me, the lights low, the city outside, and the envelope on the table like a loaded gun .
The black book stared up at me from the photo.
I hadn’t touched it.
But I wanted to.
More than I wanted to admit.
The phone rang.
I froze.
Private number.
Blocked.
I almost didn’t answer.
But I did.
“Hello?”
Silence. Then:
“You always were a good girl.”
Selene.
The voice was silk-drenched threat. Lazy and lethal.
“Wearing the perfume. Wearing the skirts. Walking the halls like you’ve earned something. Tell me, is it as easy pretending to belong as it was the first time? Or does it sting a little more now?”
I swallowed hard. “What do you want?”
“Same thing you do, darling. Peace. Safety. A place you don’t have to keep looking over your shoulder.
Your ex is back in town. Did I mention that?
Sweet boy. Misses you terribly. Still has those photos of you from your little motel phase.
You remember that, don’t you? The lace wasn’t designer then. ”
My stomach twisted.
“You don’t have to do anything dangerous. Just… open a door. Look inside. That’s it. I’ll take care of the rest. Or don’t. But when he shows up? Just remember I gave you the chance to choose.”
Click .
I didn’t move.
Didn’t breathe .
The wine glass in my hand trembled.
And all I could think—as the photo on the table stared back at me—was that I was already running out of time.