I don’t ask what she wants to drink. Just pour water for us both from the crystal decanter on my desk. We eat in silence for several minutes. It should be awkward. Should be tense. But somehow it’s not. Nola seems perfectly comfortable with thequiet, focusing on her food with the same calm attention she gives to everything.
“I was wondering,” she says, breaking into my inappropriate thoughts, “if you’d like me to request the guest list for the charity gala? I thought I might prepare briefing notes on who’s attending.”
My fork freezes halfway to my mouth.
“What did you say?”
Nola looks up, her expression open and unsuspecting.
“The charity gala. For the Foster Children’s Foundation? I found the invitation in your inbox this morning and went ahead and RSVP’d. I assumed it was something you intended to attend.” She continues eating, unaware of the storm gathering inside me. “If you need a tuxedo pressed, I can ask Franklin to?—”
“You…assumed?” I repeat.
Now she stops, finally registering the shift in my tone.
“Yes?” A slight furrow appears between her eyebrows. “The invitation was marked urgent, and the RSVP deadline is tomorrow. I didn’t want you to miss it.”
“You assumed incorrectly.” The temperature in the room seems to drop ten degrees. Inside my chest, something dark and ugly unfurls. “I’m not going to the gala.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Asher.” She sets down her fork with careful precision. “You’re right. I should have checked with you first.”
“Yes. You should have.” Each word falls like a chip of ice between us. “That foundation is none of your concern. The gala is none of your concern. You are not to touch anything related to either without my explicit direction. Is that clear?”
A flash of hurt crosses her face, quickly controlled but impossible to miss.
“Perfectly clear.”
“That will be all for now, Ms. Vance.” I turn back to my computer, dismissing her without meeting her eyes. “You can continue your work at your desk.”
She rises without a word, collecting her half-eaten lunch and returning to the corner.
Shame floods through me.
Fuck. She couldn’t have known. Had no way of understanding what that foundation means to me. What the gala represents. The memories it drags up from the darkness where I’ve buried them. Nola couldn’t have known any of that. And I punished her for it anyway.
The realization sits bitter on my tongue, like ashes from a fire I started myself.
Hours later,it’s nearly ten p.m. and I’m standing in front of the security monitors like a fucking stalker, staring at the camera feed from outside Nola’s bedroom door.
The light underneath has been on for hours.
My dinner sits cold and untouched on the desk behind me, Franklin’s silent disapproval evident in the way he removed the tray without comment thirty minutes ago. I’ve accomplished exactly nothing since she walked out of my office this afternoon. Nothing except wear a path in the floor with my pacing and count the minutes she’s stayed locked away in her room. Two hundred and seventy-four minutes, to be exact. Not that I’m counting.
I refresh the feed again, as if something might have changed in the thirty seconds since I last looked. The hallway remains empty. Her door remains closed. The thin strip of light beneathit remains constant, mocking me with its presence. Is she reading? Working? Packing to leave after the way I treated her?
The thought sends a spike of panic through me.
I turn away from the monitors, shoving a hand through my hair.
This is insane.
I’minsane.
She’s my assistant. She’s been here less than forty-eight hours. She shouldn’t matter enough to make me feel like I’m crawling out of my skin.
But she does.
I move to the windows, staring out at the darkness that swallows the mountains at night.
