Chapter 14
POV: Camille?
^....The next night….^
The city outside had gone quiet hours ago, but Vanderbilt Technologies was still alive. Maybe because we were still here—just the two of us. Alone. Together.
Papers laid scattered across the conference table along with coffee cups half empty, legal briefs marked and edited in red ink, and the leftovers of a takeout dinner that had gone cold hours ago.
Michael sat across from me with his sleeves rolled up and his neck free of a tie, all I could see was his tanned skin.
His dark hair was slightly mussed, and fatigue lingered beneath his eyes.
But even undone, he looked devastatingly composed almost like chaos bowed to him regardless. He was always in control of everything.
And I was far from composed and far from controlled.
Externally, I was holding it together. I looked calm, secure and collected but internally, I was anything but.
I tried to drown myself in thoughts of work, but really, I was drowning myself in the thought of him.
The way his eyes hovered on me, calm and certain. The way his hands lingered on the paperwork, slow and deliberate. The way his tone was always low and tranquil, when in reality it shook my insides.
C’mon Camille, get yourself together. You’re at work, in an office, going over some very important paperwork.
You know the drill. You know the contract. Stick to it.
I glanced down at the paperwork and then, without warning, it hit me, the line in the document I’d been reading over and over and over for hours.
I straightened my shoulders in my chair. “Wait. Michael, stop! look at this.”
He looked up instantly with his same calm and watchful gaze. “What is it?”
I pointed at the page. “Right here…Section 14B. These asset transfers, they don’t add up. They were hidden under different subsidiaries but if you cross reference the timestamps with the offshore filings—”
He cut me off mid sentence. “Jesus…they buried it.”
“And we just dug it up,” I breathed.
For a moment, silence filled the room, neither of us spoke and my heart was still beating wildly in my chest, thinking about the ’win’ and the way Michael’s voice even changed tone.
Then, slowly, Michael looked up, and our eyes met across the mess of papers and empty cups. His lips curved slightly into a smile, a real smile.
“You found it.”
The weight of the words landed on me.
“I think we both did,” I said, but my voice came out softer than I intended, because I knew as well as he did that it wasn’t just about the case anymore. We were talking about something else now.
There was something about the way he looked at me, the way his tone changed, the way his eyes lit up brighter, the way he let a part of him slip through his calm, level demeanor.
“You just saved this deal,” he leaned on the table and repeated slowly. “Do you have any idea what that means, Camille?”
“I’m guessing it means I get to keep my job,” I joked weakly, trying to stop my cheeks from blushing.
He laughed. “It means you just changed everything.”
The weight of his words sank in slowly, grounding me in place but so did the warmth of his nearness.
His arm brushed mine again as he reached for the folder, and I could feel the jolt beneath my skin, the pulse that had nothing to do with the adrenaline of anything work related. It had everything to do with him.
My mind was a warzone now but I told myself, not here—not now, Camille.
Remember the contract, remember the rules. Business is business.
We kept working despite this and our voices grew quieter while our movements slowed. There were moments when our hands nearly touched, and every time they didn’t, the air between us felt charged witth a force so great—so electric.
I was halfway through highlighting an important clause when I felt my head grow heavy.
I needed another cup of coffee, stat.
Michael shifted in his seat. “Camille,” his voice sounded through my headache.
I looked up slowly and met his intense gaze. “I’m fine.”
He didn’t smile. In fact, he just looked through me if he could see the truth. “You’ve been running on caffeine for a few days straight. You’re not fine. You should get some rest, actual rest, not a few hours of sleep.”
I argued instead. “I can push through it, I’m fine.”
He studied me, willing me to stop arguing with just a single look. “I know you can but you shouldn’t have to.”
The gentleness in his voice caught me off guard.
Michael Vanderbilt didn’t do gentle. He commanded, ordered, and expected. But this…the way he spoke now, was different.
“I don’t know how to stop when something needs to be done,” I admitted softly.
And that was the truth after all, I was prone to work, especially in conditions like this, especially when I needed distraction.
“Driven,” he responded, looking at me. “You remind me of myself when I started all this. Except…” His gaze lingered on me. “You still have a heart.”
I froze at that comment. “And you don’t?”
“I learned to lock mine away a long time ago, Camille.”
And I guess in a way, I knew that, after his admission, after our shared vulnerability.
For a moment, the man in front of me wasn’t a billionaire or a boss or my fake contracted boyfriend. He was just… a person, a regular old person and one carrying too much.
I stood and moved to the window. I needed to look anywhere but at him. “You built all of this,” I said quietly. “And you still sound lonely, Michael.”
He got to his feet and approached from behind me. “You can have everything, Camille.” His voice sounded distant but he was so, so close. “And still feel like you have nothing.” His voice broke as the words left his mouth.
And something inside me broke, too.
I turned back toward him and looked into his eyes. “Then maybe what you need isn’t control.”
His gaze lifted to meet mine and for a heartbeat, it was like the world outside disappeared. “And what do I need?”
“Someone who sees you,” I said, my voice breaking slightly. “Not someone who sees you for the company or your money, just you. Michael…just Michael.”
He didn’t respond.
Instead he just looked at me, as if he was speaking without saying anything at all.
And then he moved towards me and the air shifted with him as he crossed the space between us and then he stopped close, too close. And my breath faltered as I looked at him.
I could see the faint stubble on his jaw, the exhaustion in his eyes, and the tension that lived in the line of his shoulders. I could feel the weight of what he didn’t say landing on both of us. I could see the contract tearing up into a dozen little pieces inside of my head.
And I think he could, too.
“Careful, Camille,” he murmured. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“I think I do.”
We were playing a game of cat and mouse—hot and cold—Dr. Jekel and Mr. Hyde. But even though we knew better, we didn’t stop.
His breath hitched, along with mine. He reached up then, hesitating before his hand brushed my cheek.
The touch was almost nothing. But it felt like everything.
“Camille…”
I leaned into his touch before I could think.
We stood like that for a long time, not speaking and barely breathing—while the city woke up around us. The morning light spilled through the glass, painting him in gold. For once, the mask he always wore was gone.
But as soon as I saw it was as quickly as it faded. “You should rest.”
“I don’t want to, Michael.”
His eyes met mine again, searching them. “You make this harder than it should be.”
“Maybe it’s not supposed to be easy,” I said softly.
“No, I figure it’s not.”
It was the first real crack in the walls we’d built.
For a moment, I thought I imagined the words he said as he turned his heels and walked away, leaving me alone. “You’ve seen too much and I don’t know whether that’s what will save me or destroy me.”
But a part of me felt them linger inside me.