And I’ve learned the weight of his words.
Because when I decide to have you, I will.
It echoes. It echoes at night, when I’m lying in my too-small bed staring at my ceiling. It echoes during the day, when I’m supposed to be filing or typing or doing any of the hundred menial tasks that have suddenly appeared on my desk. It haunts me every time he walks past me, every time I catch the scent ofhis cologne, every time his hand brushes mine when I hand him a document.
I hate that I notice. I hate that I remember.
This morning, my desk is buried under paperwork. Not the usual work of briefs and contracts and carefully organized files I’ve become familiar with. This is busywork. Sorting invoices from three years ago. Cross-referencing client lists that haven’t been updated since before I was hired. Reorganizing a filing cabinet that was already perfectly organized.
Punishment.
He hasn’t said so directly. He hasn’t acknowledged the event at all, actually—not the ride I accepted from Victor, not the way I threw his words back at him, not the look on his face when I walked out. But this morning when I arrived at a quarter to nine as usual, there was a stack of folders on my desk with a Post-it note in his handwriting.
Complete by end of day.
Nothing else. No explanation. No context. Just work designed to keep me busy and remind me of my place.
I’ve been at it for three hours. My eyes ache from reading faded receipts. My back hurts from hunching over files that should have been digitized years ago. And Raffaele has been in his office the entire time, door closed, in what appears to be back-to-back meetings.
Which is unusual.
Normally, he moves through the day with a rhythm I can predict. Calls in the morning. Brief reviews at my desk to check on progress. A meeting or two, rarely more than an hour each. Time spent at his window, thinking about whatever it is that men like him think about.
Today, nothing. The door opened once, to admit a man in a gray suit I didn’t recognize. It closed. Muffled voices. Then another man, different suit. Then another.
Three meetings before lunch. No acknowledgment of my existence.
Is he avoiding me?The idea sticks just long enough to be annoying.
Why would I care if he’s avoiding me? This is a job. A prison sentence dressed up as employment. The less I see of Raffaele D’Amico, the better.
Except.
You wear it well.I shake my head. Focus on the invoices.
It doesn’t matter. None of it matters. I just need to get through the day, go home, and figure out what the hell I’m going to do with my life.
The men arrive around two.
I hear them before I see them—loud voices in the hallway, a burst of laughter that doesn’t belong in this quiet, carpeted space. The elevator doors open, and four of them spill out like they own the place.
They’re covered in tattoos. All of them. Ink crawling up necks, disappearing under expensive shirts that don’t quite fit right. The leader—at least I assume he’s the leader, based on the way the others orbit around him—has a snake tattoo coiled around his forearm, its head resting on the back of his hand.
They’re not lawyers. They’re not businessmen.
They’re exactly what this place pretends not to be.
“This D’Amico’s floor?” Snake Tattoo asks, not looking at me.
“Yes. Can I help you?”
Now he looks.
“Nice,” he says to the man beside him. “D’Amico’s got good taste in secretaries.”
“Assistant,” I correct, before I can stop myself.
“You answer phones, right? Fetch coffee?” An oily smile slithers over his face and his voice drops slightly. “Bend over filing cabinets?”
