I threw the blanket off and ran for the bathroom. I bathed in under three minutes, so fast that I'm not sure the soap even touched my skin. I pulled on my black dress, grabbed my shoes, and didn't bother putting them on. I would wear them along the way. Every second counted.
Because every little second I added to my lateness could cost me my job and I could not lose this job.
On my way to the door, my eyes landed on the small table in the corner of the room, where my mother's medicine bottles stood in a neat row. Some were half empty. One was nearly finished. Each bottle cost more than I earned in a week, and my mother was dying without them.
That was the only reason I put up with a boss who worked like the sun had never been invented.
I hopped down the stairs on one foot, jammed my toe into my shoe on the second floor landing, and ran out into the cold night, my hair still dripping down my back.
By the time I reached the glass tower of Knight Industries, my lungs were on fire, my chest pounding very fast.
The lobby was empty and silent. The night guard didn't even glance up as I slapped my card against the scanner and slid into the elevator. I pressed the top floor and stared at my watch as the numbers climbed.
1:09 AM. One minute to spare.
"Thank God, thank God, thank God," I whispered to myself.
The elevator opened onto the executive floor. The hallway was cold and dim, and at the far end stood the black double doors of the CEO's office. My desk sat just outside them, a small wooden island in a sea of marble.
But there was someone standing by my desk.
A woman.
She was tall, and she carried herself like the building belonged to her. Her dark hair fell in one smooth sheet to her waist, her lipstick was the exact red of a fresh wound, and her white coat was the kind of expensive that didn't have a visible price tag. One sharp heel tapped against the marble, over and over again, like a clock counting down my patience.
I slowed. That's not a staff. And she's not here to deliver a package either.
Her eyes slid over me, from my damp hair to my mismatched earrings to my scuffed shoes, and her nose wrinkled as if I smelled bad.
"You." She didn't even say hello. "Tell Alex I'm here. Now."she said putting on more red lipstick and it irritates me because it's already so red like blood which the fuck does she need to add more?
I forced a polite smile. At one in the morning, polite was all I had left.
"Good morning, ma'am. Mr. Knight isn't expecting anyone according to his schedule for tonight. Do you have an appointment?"
She laughed. It was soft and cold and left a chill on my arms.
"An appointment." She repeated the word as if it were a joke she'd heard a hundred times. "I don't need one. Move aside, little human girl."
"I'm sorry, I can't let you in without one," I said, as gently as I could. "But if you tell me your name, I can book you a slot for tomorrow. Mr. Knight is very strict about his..."
"My name?"Something flashed across her face, and the smile slid right off.
"I am Whitney Vale," she said, each word sharp enough to cut. "I am Alex's betrothed. Our families arranged our marriage before you were old enough to hold a pen. And you, his assistant, are going to ask me to book a slot?"
My stomach dropped to my shoes. Betrothed?
In two years, I had never heard Alex mention a fiancée. Not once. I knew his coffee order, his flight schedules, his mother's birthday, and the names of the three women who'd cried in his office last winter. But I had never heard her name.
"Miss Vale," I said slowly, keeping my voice steady. "I'm sure you're very important to him. But rules are rules, and if I break one, I lose my job. I'm sorry."
"Sorry?." Whitney stepped closer, and the temperature of the room dropped. "You say it like it means something."
"It means I'm trying to be polite," I said before I could stop myself. "At one in the morning. For both of us."
Her eyes narrowed. A tiny, dangerous smile curved her lips.
"Oh," she said softly. "You have a sharp tongue." And then the lights above us flickered.
I felt it first on my skin, a prickle, like the moment before a thunderstorm. Whitney's shadow stretched across the wall behind her, and it wasn't the shadow of a woman anymore. It had black thick wings like bats.
Something small and dark burst from the folds of her coat and flapped past my face, close enough that I felt the wind of its wings. I stumbled back with a yelp as a bat swooped once, twice, then dropped to the marble floor. Black smoke curled up around it.
And in a heartbeat, Whitney stood there again, in human form, smoothing her hair as if nothing had happened.
I couldn't breathe. My brain scrambled for a logical explanation: a trick, a hologram, I'm still asleep and this is a nightmare brought on by too much stress.....
"You humans," Whitney said, almost kindly. "So slow. So fragile. You see something you don't understand and you start looking for excuses."
She raised one hand.
"Let's see how fragile you really are." An Invisible force slammed into my chest.
I flew backward. My heel caught the edge of the carpet, my bag tore off my shoulder, and the world tilted. The marble floor came rushing up at me, shiny and hard and merciless.
This is going to hurt.
I squeezed my eyes shut.
And then...Nothing.
No crash, no pain or sound, then I opened my eyes.
The whole room had stopped. My bag hung in midair beside me. A page that had slipped out of my folder floated halfway to the floor, its corner bent. Whitney stood frozen with her hand still lifted, her cruel smile locked on her face like a mask.
No humming from the lights. No hum from the air conditioning. Not even the sound of my own heartbeat.
Then I felt a hand, pressed firmly against my waist. Warm. Strong. Holding me up. Slowly, I turned my head.
Alex Knight stood over me.
His black suit was perfect, but his dark hair was slightly disordered, as though he had come out of his office in a hurry. His eyes were the color of burning coals. They didn't look human, and they didn't look calm.
He didn't say a word. He just lifted his other hand and snapped his fingers. The world rushed back.
My bag hit the floor with a thud. The page landed softly. The lights hummed again. Whitney gasped, and my heart came back to life, hammering so hard I thought everyone could hear it.
Alex lifted me back onto my feet, and his hand stayed at my waist for one second longer than it needed to before he let go.
"Thank you, sir," I whispered. My voice shook.
He didn't answer me. His gaze had already moved to the woman across the room, and it was colder than I had ever seen it.
"Whitney." His voice was low, smooth, and terrifying, like a blade being drawn slowly from its sheath. "You used your magic. In my building. On my assistant."
Her face went pale for half a second. Then she lifted her chin and put on a sweet smile.
"My king, I only wanted to see you. This human l was being rude, and I..."
King? The word echoed in my head like a bell.
"Get out of my office."
"Babe..."
"Now."
The word rolled through the room like thunder. The windows rattled in their frames. Whitney's red lips trembled, and she looked at me, not at him, with a hatred so pure that my stomach turned cold.
"You'll regret this," she whispered, so quietly that only I could hear. "I promise you that, little human. I'll make you pay for every second of it."
She spun on her heel and stormed to the elevator. The doors closed on her furious face.
Silence settled over the floor again.
I knelt and gathered my bag and papers, my hands trembling so badly I dropped the same page twice. I didn't dare look at the man standing next to me.
"Olive."
I straightened. "Y-yes, Mr. Knight?"
He was looking at me in a way I couldn't read. It wasn't anger, and it wasn't concern. The fire had faded from his eyes, leaving them a deep, dark brown, but something still burned behind them.
"You saw everything," he asked quietly.
My heart skipped. "I... I'm not sure what I saw, sir."
A slow, dangerous smile touched his lips "Good. Keep it that way."
He turned and walked toward his office, and I stood in the middle of the hallway with my heart racing and my mother's medicine bottles flashing through my mind.
Yes I've to stay calm and pass through this, I need this job to get mom more meds
My boss wasn't just a demon in the way everyone at the office joked about. He was the King of Demons. And he had just saved my life.
I had a feeling it was going to cost me far more than I could afford to pay.
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