Chapter 11 — There Is No After
POV: Elena
Gabriel’s office door closed with a mechanical click—final, definitive—that sounded less like the end of a conversation and more like the shot from a firing squad.
I stood in the hallway for a second, staring at the dark, polished wood that now separated me from the man who, minutes before, had been buried inside me, whispering promises of oblivion and possession.
The silence on the other side was absolute.
No footsteps. No sound of a chair scraping.
Just the static hum of central air and the deafening beat of my own heart, trying to pump blood to extremities that felt like ice.
My legs were shaking.
Not a subtle tremor. A violent, uncontrollable vibration that climbed from my knees to my jaw, making my teeth chatter.
I could still feel him in me—the wetness between my thighs, the burn on my skin where his beard had scraped, the phantom ache in my breasts where he’d squeezed with desperate force.
Miscalculation.
His words echoed in my skull, ricocheting against the walls of my humiliation.
He called what happened a mistake. A flaw in the spreadsheet. A deviation in the projection chart.
I brought my hand to my mouth, tasting metal. My blood, his. All mixed together.
A phone rang in a nearby cubicle, the shrill sound yanking me back to the corporate reality of the fourteenth floor. I couldn’t just stand here. I looked like a castaway the sea had just spat out: hair disheveled, blouse buttoned wrong, lips swollen and raw as if they’d been scraped clean.
Anyone who looked at me would know.
They wouldn’t need proof, recordings, or witnesses. The smell of sex and violence rolled off me like a toxic cloud.
I clutched my purse to my chest, feeling the small plastic disc of the listening device dig into my rib—a harsh reminder that I’d entered that room as a spy and left as a discarded lover—and forced my feet to move.
The hallway seemed endless. The gray carpet stretched before me like a rough tongue. I passed the glass walls of empty conference rooms, catching my ghostly reflection flashing by—a dark smudge in a world of corporate transparency.
“Miss Walsh?”
The voice came from my left. I froze.
It was Richard’s assistant. A woman in her forties with thick-framed glasses and a perpetually worried expression. She stood in her boss’s doorway, holding a stack of folders, peering down the empty hallway with confusion.
“Have you seen Mr. Hale?” she asked. “He had a meeting with Vanguard at two and didn’t show up. His cell phone is off.”
Richard’s name hit me like an electric shock.
The image of him on the floor of the file room—bleeding, broken, destroyed by Gabriel’s hands—flashed through my mind.
I swallowed the bile rising in my throat.
“No,” I replied, my voice hoarse, unrecognizable. “I haven’t seen him.”
The assistant frowned, her eyes dropping to my neck. I yanked up my collar, covering the purple mark and the torn seam.
“Are you all right?” she asked, professional concern tinged with morbid curiosity. “You look... shaken.”
“Migraine,” I lied, the word automatic. “I need... I need to go to the bathroom.”
I didn’t wait for her response. I ran.
I burst into the women’s bathroom and went straight to the farthest stall, locking the door with trembling hands. The moment the latch clicked, my legs gave out.
I slid down the cold tile wall to the floor, hugging my knees.
The “after” was supposed to be the moment of clarity. The moment when adrenaline fades and you assess the damage. But there was no clarity here. Only the overwhelming physical sensation of having been cracked open and left exposed.
I closed my eyes and saw Gabriel’s face above mine. The ferocity in his eyes. The way he’d said “You’re mine.”
He lied.
If I were his, he wouldn’t have sent me away. If I were his, he wouldn’t be sitting in that leather chair right now, cleaning up the chaos we’d created as if it were just another legal problem to solve.
He wasn’t afraid of compromising the operation. He was afraid of having felt something. And his cowardice hurt more than Richard’s violence.
I sat there on the bathroom floor of an elite law firm, trembling, until the main door opened and I heard heels clicking and muffled laughter.
I scrambled up, wiping my face with the backs of my hands. I couldn’t fall apart. Not here. Not where they could see.
I left the stall and went to the sink. The mirror showed me a stranger.
My eyes were dilated, dark, burning with a fever that wouldn’t break. My mouth was swollen, bitten. The skin of my neck, where the torn collar exposed bare flesh, mapped Gabriel’s violence in shades of purple and navy.
I washed my face with ice-cold water, scrubbing my skin until it burned, trying to wash away the sensation of his hands, his scent. But it was useless. He was under my skin. He'd seeped into my bloodstream.
I fixed my hair as best I could, pulling it into a severe bun to salvage some semblance of professionalism. I used a safety pin I found at the bottom of my purse to close the tear in my blouse collar.
I took a deep breath. One, two, three times.
You are Elena Walsh. You survived creditors, evictions, and your brother's stupidity. You will survive an orgasm and a kick to the curb.
I left the bathroom.
The office had changed.
The atmosphere, once charged with routine urgency, now vibrated with a different kind of electric tension. Groups of people whispered in the hallways. Phones rang unanswered.
I walked to my makeshift desk in the hallway, feeling stares burning into my back. Did they know? Had they seen Richard leave?
I sat down and opened my laptop, staring at the black screen. I should be working. Should be translating. But the letters looked like meaningless hieroglyphics.
Then the email arrived.
A soft ping that echoed across hundreds of computers simultaneously, creating a wave of mouse clicks across the floor.
The sender was Executive Office. The subject: Internal Communication.
I opened the message, my heart pounding in my throat.
To: All Staff
From: Gabriel Moretti, Senior Partner
Subject: Corporate Restructuring
We inform you that, effective this date, Mr. Richard Hale is stepping away from his duties as Named Partner of the firm due to urgent and unforeseen health reasons. The severity of his condition requires immediate treatment and complete rest out of state.
During this transition period, all of Mr. Hale's portfolios and responsibilities will be absorbed directly by my office.
We appreciate everyone's understanding and discretion during this difficult time.
Gabriel Moretti
Health reasons.
I almost laughed out loud. The laughter bubbled up in my throat, hysterical and bitter.
A broken nose, bruised ribs, and a shattered ego were now classified as “health reasons.” Gabriel hadn't just won; he'd erased Richard from corporate existence in less than thirty minutes.
I looked at the closed door of his office at the end of the hallway.
He had typed that email. Probably right after I left. While I was in the bathroom trying to stop shaking, he was drafting the partner's professional death certificate.
His efficiency was terrifying. And arousing.
His “miscalculation” hadn't stopped him from functioning. If anything, it seemed to have sharpened him.
My phone vibrated on the desk, buzzing against the wood.
It was Thomas.
I looked at my brother's name on the screen. The person I'd entered this hell for. The person whose freedom had cost me my soul.
I answered, pressing the phone to my ear and cupping my hand over the other to muffle the office noise.
“Hello?”
“Elena!” Thomas's voice was euphoric, practically shouting. “Did you see the news? No, of course you didn't, you're buried in there. But man, the market is going crazy!”
“What are you talking about, Thomas?”
“Vanguard stock! It took a sharp drop an hour ago, but now it's climbing again. And there's a rumor… a rumor on financial forums that there's been a change in legal representation. They're saying Moretti & Hale is doing an internal cleanup to shield the client.”
I closed my eyes. Thomas was tracking the stock market while his own life hung in the balance. His disconnect from reality was fascinating.
“It's true,” I whispered. “Richard Hale is out.”
“The partner? The guy who signed the papers?” Thomas let out a long whistle. “Damn, Elena. Your boss doesn't mess around. He cut his own flesh to save the contract. That's… that's genius.”
“He didn't do it for the contract, Thomas.”
“Then what? Out of the goodness of his heart?” Thomas laughed. “These guys are sharks, El. They only move for blood or money. But hey, if it means the blame falls on Hale and not me… I'm Gabriel Moretti's biggest fan. I should send him a fruit basket.”
“Don't send anything.” My voice came out hard. “Don't go near him. Don't say his name. Just… stay quiet, Thomas. For the first time in your life, stay quiet.”
“Okay, okay. Work stress, I get it. But seriously, El... when this is over, you should ask for a bonus. Sounds like you're in the eye of the storm.”
“I am,” I murmured, looking at Gabriel's door. “I'm right in the eye.”
I hung up without saying goodbye.
Bonus.
Thomas thought this was a job. He thought I'd walk out of here with a check and a LinkedIn recommendation. He didn't know I'd walk out of here with marks on my skin and a hole in my chest the size of Gabriel Moretti.
The day dragged on.
I stayed at my desk, pretending to work, but my eyes kept drifting back to his door every five minutes. I waited for him to come out. Waited for him to call me. Waited for him to say the email was just the beginning, that we needed to talk, that what happened on his desk wasn't a mistake.
But the door remained closed.
Assistants went in and out, carrying papers, emerging pale and efficient. He was in there. He was working. He was managing the empire he'd just consolidated.
And I was on the outside.
By seven, the office began to empty. The rain outside had stopped, leaving only the wet gleam on the dark windows.