Chapter 3 Don't lie to me

Damian Knight didn't like distractions.

He didn't allow noise. He didn't allow mistakes.

Distractions were dangerous. Distractions bled into weakness. And weakness invited betrayal.

He'd built an empire by cutting through lies faster than anyone else could spin them. But Isabella Volkov...

She wasn't lying with her mouth.

She was lying with her silence.

And yet... for the third time in ten minutes, he caught himself glancing through the glass toward the girl sitting at the desk outside his door.

Her fingers hovered above the keyboard but didn't type. Her body was still, but her shoulders were rigid.

Something was wrong.

He tapped the intercom. "Inside. Now."

The door clicked open seconds later.

Isabella entered like she was walking into a lion's den.

But Damian wasn't watching her walk. He was watching her eyes.

She looked startled. Nervous. Too quiet even for her.

Not the usual nervous-the kind you get when you mess up an email. This was the kind of silence that came with trauma. The kind people wore like armor when they'd already learned what screaming earned them.

He gestured to the seat across from him. "Sit."

She obeyed.

He didn't say anything for a moment. Just leaned back, studying her like a man breaking down a code.

"I run a company with over three thousand employees," he said. "And yet in this building-on this floor-people fear speaking without permission."

She said nothing.

"I allow that fear. Because it keeps things clean."

Still, she didn't speak. Her hands folded on her lap, thumbs brushing each other in rhythm.

"I've only seen two people look the way you look right now," he continued. "One of them died five years ago. The other changed her name and vanished."

Her eyes widened.

"Which are you?"

She blinked rapidly. "Sir?"

He tilted his head, voice colder. "Don't lie to me."

Her breath hitched.

But before she could answer, his voice lowered another notch. "Something happened."

She looked down. "I'm fine."

Liar.

He could smell fear. He'd learned to in boardrooms, in backroom deals, in hostile takeovers. And she was swimming in it.

He stood and walked around the desk slowly.

She tensed.

"I saw you open the drawer," he said quietly. "You weren't looking for a pen."

Her lips parted.

"You found something."

Silence.

"Give it to me."

She hesitated.

Then, with trembling fingers, she reached into her pocket and pulled out the note.

Damian took it. Opened it. Read the two words.

LEAVE NOW.

He stared at it for several seconds.

Then... something shifted in his expression. A flash of something dark.

His grip tightened on the paper. "Who gave this to you?"

"I don't know."

He turned away from her and walked to the window. Stared down at the street below like he could spot a threat in the crowd.From this angle, the city below looked harmless-tiny and ordinary. But he knew better.

He didn't see her drawer. He saw blood on a bathroom tile. Screams in foreign tongues. Faces he buried but never forgot.

Whoever planted this wasn't just watching her.

They were watching him.

"You should've told me immediately."

"I didn't want to lose the job."

He turned.

"You think that piece of paper can do what I can't?"

Her breath caught.

He stepped closer, slowly, until he was right in front of her.

His voice dropped to a growl.

"Whoever put this in your drawer thinks you're weak."

She looked down.

"You're not," he said. "But you act like it. And that makes you vulnerable. That makes you a target."

A pause.

"Not on my watch."

Her head snapped up.

His eyes burned into hers.

"If anyone touches you..." he leaned in just slightly, his voice rough and low, "they'll wish they hadn't."

Later that day, Isabella returned from the break room with a paper cup of tea in her hand. The hallway was quiet again, like nothing had happened. Like she hadn't handed a warning note to a billionaire with a temper forged in steel.

But when she reached her desk, something was different.

The drawer, the same one that had held the note was locked.

On top of it was another note.

Written in clean, sharp pen strokes:

"No one gets near what's mine."

Her pulse stuttered.

Beside it sat a sleek black access card with her name carved in gold.

Isabella Volkov – Executive Level Clearance

She stared at it.

Then her eyes flicked to the signature at the bottom of the note.

D. Knight.

Her hands trembled slightly as she picked up the keycard.

She wasn't just an assistant anymore.

She was marked.

Protected.

Or maybe claimed.

But just as she turned it over in her palm, the elevator behind her pinged open.

A man stepped out. Unfamiliar.

Tall. Smiling.

Gray jacket. Smooth shoes. Casual,too casual for her liking.

He didn't belong.

His eyes scanned the hallway slowly... until they landed on Isabella.

He didn't look surprised.

He looked satisfied.

He walked past her desk, fingers trailing across the corner of it lightly.

And as he passed...

He smiled.

Not like a stranger.

Like a man who knew exactly what drawer she'd opened.

Then the elevator doors slid closed again. .

And then... he was gone.

But the smell of his cologne lingered-bitter citrus, and something else beneath it. Smoke.

She gripped the desk to steady her breath.

Inside the office, Damian looked up from his call. His eyes found her through the glass. She was pale again. Too pale.

His jaw locked.

"I'll call you back," he told the person on the other end.

He hung up and rose from his desk.

He didn't hesitate.

He walked straight to security.

At security, Damian leaned over the shoulder of his lead tech.

"Rewind ten minutes."

The screen showed the unfamiliar man. The walk. The pause. The smile.

"Zoom in," Damian said.

The man's smile widened as he passed Isabella's desk.

Someone had been on his floor.

And if they'd touched her again

There would be hell to pay.