Chapter 2

The coffee mug in my drawer had been overturned. Brown liquid had soaked through an entire week's worth of client files. Shredded paper was jammed between the keys of my keyboard. On the computer screen, someone had drawn a bright red X in lipstick.

Chloe followed Vincent in, saw my desk, and immediately covered her mouth. "How could this happen?"

She walked over and reached for the printed note.

I caught her hand. "Don't touch it."

Her eyes went red instantly. "Eva, I'm only trying to help."

I looked at the faint red residue along the edges of her fingernails—the exact same shade as the lipstick on my screen.

"Trying to help me, or trying not to leave fingerprints?"

The color drained from Chloe's face.

Vincent's voice cut through, low and hard. "Eva Hart."

I looked at him.

"She's being kind. Don't bite the hand that's trying to help you."

"And what about this?" I held his gaze and finally asked the question I already knew would go unanswered. "Everyone here calls me your mistress. Vincent, aren't you going to set the record straight?"

The entire office floor went silent.

His brow furrowed, as though I'd handed him yet another unbearable inconvenience.

"This is a workplace. There's no need to publicize personal relationships."

"But they're using a personal relationship to humiliate me."

"If you kept your distance from me around the office, would they be making assumptions?"

So it was still my fault.

Chloe hooked her arm through his and spoke gently. "Eva, don't push Boss. He has his own difficulties."

In that moment, the contempt in every pair of eyes around us deepened.

I slowly let go, peeled the note off my desk, folded it, and slipped it into my bag.

Vincent asked, "What are you keeping that for?"

"To remind myself."

"Remind yourself of what?"

I looked up at him. "That some places aren't worth staying in."

After my desk was trashed, I received no explanation.

Admin gave me a replacement keyboard—a used one—and told me to redo the paperwork myself.

"The cameras didn't catch who did it. Don't blow this out of proportion."

But there were over a dozen cameras covering the office floor. It wasn't that they couldn't find out. They simply didn't want to cross Chloe—didn't want to cross the Boss's favorite.

I worked until the middle of the night, re-entering every piece of data from the coffee-soaked files, line by line.

At one in the morning, Vincent came out of his office and paused slightly when he saw me still there.

"Why haven't you left?"

"These files are due tomorrow."

He glanced at the damp papers on my desk. "Just reprint them."

"Some of these have handwritten notes from clients. There's no digital backup."

He frowned. "That's a problem with your work habits."

I lowered my head and didn't argue.

Seven years ago, when he'd first taken over the family's legitimate business, I'd shared a basement office with him—no heating. In the dead of winter, I'd get up in the middle of the night to organize his files, my hands so numb I could barely hold a pen.

He woke up, saw me, and tucked my hands inside his coat against his chest. "When I have money someday, I'll never let you suffer again."

I'd held onto that for seven years.

He'd probably forgotten it long ago.

Vincent stood beside my desk for a while, then set his car keys on the table. "Pack up. I'll drive you home."

I looked up at him.

He avoided my gaze, his tone still detached. "If you work yourself sick, you'll just blame me for not taking care of you."

For a split second, I almost believed he still cared.

Then the elevator doors opened, and Chloe came rushing out with her coat in her arms. "Boss, my car's in the shop. Can you give me a ride?"

Vincent took back his keys. "Let's go."

Then he turned to me. "Take a cab. Expense it."

I watched his retreating back and realized I wasn't even surprised.

The next morning, a client called, furious, demanding to know why the pricing had been changed without authorization.

I pulled up the file and found that the costs in the final version had been artificially lowered. If we signed the contract based on this quote, the company would lose millions.

The last person to modify the file was Chloe.

When the supervisor called us both into the conference room, Vincent was there too.

The tech team projected the access log onto the screen. "The file was modified yesterday afternoon. The login account belongs to Chloe Lane."

Chloe's eyes went red immediately. "It wasn't me. I just borrowed Eva's computer to print something yesterday. I must have forgotten to log out."

I said flatly, "You were logged in under your own account."

"But it was your computer." She bit her lip and looked at me. "Eva, I know you don't like me, but a mistake like this could destroy my career. You can't frame me just because Boss treats me well."

Low murmurs rippled through the conference room.

Vincent was silent for a moment. Then he slid a disciplinary form in front of me.

"Sign it."