His Most Dangerous Asset

Chapter 1

Layla

“I’m sorry, but the payment was declined.” The voice on the phone is professionally flat, devoid of any real sympathy. It’s the third call this morning.

I press the phone harder against my ear, as if proximity can change the words. “There must be a mistake. Can you please try running the card again?” My own voice is tight, a thin wire of control pulled taut over a pit of panic.

“Ma’am, I’ve run it twice. The system is showing insufficient funds.”

My eyes squeeze shut. I picture my mother on the other end of the line from me, standing in the fluorescent glare of the pharmacy, my little sister Maya sitting in a worn out plastic chair, her breathing just a little too shallow. The image fuels the fire in my gut.

“It’s for an Albuterol refill. My sister needs it. Her current inhaler is almost empty.”

“I understand, but there’s nothing I can do without payment. The total is two hundred and forty three dollars.”

Two hundred and forty three dollars. It might as well be a million. That’s food for three weeks. That’s the electric bill and the internet I need for my classes. My fingers tremble as I clutch the strap of my second hand purse. It’s the nicest thing I own, and the clasp is broken.

“Okay,” I say, my voice cracking just a little. “Okay, thank you.”

I hang up before she can offer any more useless platitudes. A deep, shuddering breath escapes me. I can’t fall apart. Not here. Not now.

I stand on a sidewalk paved with what looks like polished granite, staring up at a skyscraper that pierces the clouds. The Veleno Corp headquarters isn't just a building; it's a monument to a level of wealth I can’t comprehend. The sun glints off a thousand panes of glass, a blinding, indifferent glare.

This is it. My first day. The internship that’s supposed to be the first step toward fixing everything. The one I beat out three hundred other applicants for, the one my professors said was a golden ticket.

Right now, it just feels like another world I don’t belong in.

My phone buzzes. It’s my mom. I know what she’s going to ask. I hit ignore, my thumb hovering over the screen. I type out a text instead.

*Don’t worry. I’ll transfer the money in a few hours. Just get her home. I love you both.*

It’s a lie. I have thirty seven dollars in my account. But it’s a necessary one. It buys her a few hours of peace. It buys me a few hours to figure out how to make it true.

Taking another breath, I push through the massive, revolving glass doors. The air inside is different. It’s cool, crisp, and smells faintly of citrus and clean money. The lobby is a cavern of white marble and gleaming steel. A waterfall cascades down a black stone wall behind a reception desk that’s longer than my entire apartment. Men and women in impeccably tailored suits glide across the floor, their conversations a low, confident murmur. Their shoes make no sound.

My own sensible black flats suddenly feel like clown shoes. The blazer I found at the thrift store, the one I so carefully steamed this morning, feels cheap and flimsy.

“Can I help you?” The receptionist’s smile is perfect and practiced. She looks like a model, not a scratch on her flawless makeup.

“I’m Layla Hassan,” I say, my voice coming out smaller than I’d like. “It’s my first day. I’m an intern in the finance department.”

Her fingers dance across a keyboard embedded in the desk. “Ah, yes. Chad will be your supervisor. He’s been notified. You can have a seat over there. Someone will be down to collect you shortly.”

I thank her and walk over to a set of low leather couches. Sitting on the edge, I clutch my purse in my lap. I feel like an exhibit. The scholarship kid from the state school, on display in the lion’s den.

I try to focus on the numbers. Numbers are my sanctuary. They make sense. They follow rules. I mentally calculate the amortization schedule for my student loans. I estimate the building’s probable maintenance budget based on its square footage. It’s a game I play to calm my nerves, to turn the world into a puzzle I can solve. But today, the numbers are just swimming in my head, drowned out by the pounding of my heart.

“Layla Hassan?”

The voice is sharp, impatient. I look up to see a man in his late twenties. His blond hair is perfectly coiffed, his suit is a shade of blue so dark it’s almost black, and his watch probably costs more than my tuition. He holds a tablet in one hand and doesn’t offer the other.

“I’m Chad. Senior Analyst. Follow me.” He turns before I can even get a word out, clearly expecting me to keep up.

I scramble to my feet and hurry after him. He moves fast, navigating the maze of cubicles and glass walled offices like a shark in its home waters. I get flashes of activity, tense meetings, people staring intently at glowing screens, the air humming with quiet, focused energy.

“The finance department occupies the entire thirty fourth floor,” Chad says over his shoulder, not bothering to check if I’m still there. “Our team handles portfolio reconciliation. The work is precise. There is no room for error. Do you understand?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Good.”

He stops abruptly at a small, empty desk wedged between a massive printer and a filing cabinet. My desk. It’s the only one in the entire open plan office that looks like an afterthought.

“This is you,” he says, gesturing vaguely at the empty chair. He still hasn’t made eye contact. He’s looking at his tablet, swiping through something with an annoyed flick of his thumb.

“Thank you. I’m really excited to be here and ready to learn whatever…”

He cuts me off with a sigh, finally lifting his eyes from the screen. They’re a cold, dismissive blue. He scans me from head to toe, and I feel his judgment like a physical slap. The thrift store blazer, the slightly worn purse, the nervous energy I can’t seem to hide. His lip curls in a faint, almost imperceptible sneer.

“Right. We’ll start you off easy. This is a backlog of quarterly expense reports.” He drops a stack of binders on the desk that makes the whole thing wobble. “I need you to manually verify the receipts against the line items and then scan them into the archive server. The instructions are on a sticky note. Try not to delete the entire server.” He smirks, as if he’s just made the cleverest joke in the world.

My mind, the one that aced advanced calculus and can spot a flawed algorithm from a mile away, reels. Data entry. He’s giving me busy work. It’s a test and a dismissal all in one.

“Of course,” I say, my voice steady despite the fury and humiliation coiling in my stomach. I need this job. I can’t afford a conscience or a backbone. Not yet.

“Good. My desk is over there.” He points to a large, corner workspace with three monitors. “Don’t bother me unless the building is on fire. And even then, send an email first.”

He walks away, already absorbed in his tablet again, leaving me standing by my sad little desk with a mountain of paper. I can feel the eyes of the other analysts on me. I am the intern. The charity case. The one who doesn't belong.

I slide into the chair, the cheap plastic groaning under my weight. My reflection is a pale, distorted ghost in the dark screen of the monitor. For a moment, my mom’s frantic face flashes in my mind. Maya’s wheezing breaths. The pharmacy’s cold rejection. The two hundred and forty three dollars.

I will not fail. I can do this. I can swallow my pride and scan these stupid receipts. I can be invisible. I can survive Chad. I can survive anything for them.

I take a deep breath and power on the computer. As the screen flickers to life, I feel a shift in the atmosphere of the office. The low hum of conversation drops. People are standing, their postures subtly more attentive. I look up, following their gaze toward the main elevators.

The doors slide open with a soft chime.

And he steps out.

I’ve only seen him in magazines and on business news channels. Adrian Veleno. The CEO. The man who inherited an empire at twenty five and tripled its value in a decade. In person, he is a force of nature. He wears a charcoal gray suit that fits him like a second skin, but it’s the way he holds himself that commands the room. A quiet, dangerous stillness. An aura of absolute power that seems to bend the very air around him.

He’s flanked by two other men, but they’re just shadows. All light seems to gravitate toward him. His hair is jet black, his jawline sharp, and even from across the massive floor, I can feel the intensity of his presence. He’s speaking to one of the men beside him, his voice too low to hear, but the authority in it is unmistakable.

Chad is practically standing at attention near his desk, his earlier arrogance replaced by a fawning eagerness. He looks like a puppy hoping for a scrap from the master’s table.

I should look away. I should focus on my mountain of binders. I am a nobody, a piece of office furniture. He would never have a reason to look at me.

But I can’t.

And then, he does. As he walks through the center of the office, his head turns slightly. His gaze sweeps across the room, a king surveying his domain. It’s a brief, cursory glance, but it stops when it lands on me.

It’s only for a second. Maybe not even that long. A single beat of a heart.

But in that second, the entire, cavernous office disappears. There is only the silent, electric connection between his eyes and mine. They are the color of a stormy sea, deep and turbulent. They don't just see me. They feel like they excavate me, stripping away the cheap blazer and the practiced composure, and laying bare the raw, desperate hunger underneath. He sees the fear, the fight, the crushing weight of the two hundred and forty three dollars I don’t have.

There is no warmth in his gaze. No pity. Just a flash of something unreadable. A flicker of cold, calculating curiosity.

My breath catches in my throat. My heart hammers against my ribs, a frantic, trapped bird. A hot flush creeps up my neck. I feel completely, utterly exposed.

Then, just as quickly as it happened, it’s over. He turns his head, continuing his conversation as he walks toward the corner offices, the moment broken. He’s gone. The spell is shattered.

The office slowly returns to its normal rhythm. The low hum of work resumes. But I can’t move. I sit frozen at my little desk, my hand hovering over the mouse.

Chad made me feel small. Adrian Veleno, with a single, fleeting glance, made me feel like I don’t exist at all, except as a momentary puzzle he has already solved and forgotten.

I look down at the first binder. The name on the expense report is Chad’s. I stare at the columns of numbers, but they’re just meaningless symbols. All I can see are those stormy eyes. A chill runs down my spine that has nothing to do with the office air conditioning.

This place is more dangerous than I ever imagined. And I just walked straight into the center of the storm.

Chapter 2

Layla

My fingers are frozen over the keyboard. The memory of Adrian Veleno’s eyes is burned into the back of my eyelids. A king surveying his domain. And me, a speck of dust on his marble floor.

The hum of the office returns to its normal frequency. The spell is broken. But the chill remains.

I force my gaze down to the mountain of binders on my desk. Chad’s expenses. I open the first one. A receipt for a two hundred dollar steak dinner, logged as a ‘client meeting’. Another for a five hundred dollar bottle of scotch, labeled ‘office supplies’.

The hypocrisy is a bitter pill. I need money for my sister’s medicine, and he’s expensing liquor that costs more than my rent. I feel the fury coiling in my stomach again, hot and tight. But I shove it down. I have to.

I begin the work. Click, scan. Click, scan. The rhythm is mind numbing, a tedious drumbeat marking the slow death of my brain cells. Each receipt is a tiny monument to a life I can’t imagine. Golf outings. Valet parking. First class flights. I verify the numbers, my mind drifting to the balance of my own bank account. Thirty seven dollars.

Hours bleed into one another. The sky outside the panoramic windows shifts from bright blue to a soft, hazy orange. My back aches. My eyes burn from the screen’s glare.

“Are you kidding me? Are you actually kidding me?”

Chad’s voice slices through the quiet focus of the department. He isn’t talking to anyone in particular, just yelling at his monitor. I look up from my pile of paper. He’s standing now, running a hand through his perfect hair, messing it up for the first time all day.

An older analyst from a nearby desk, a kind looking woman named Sarah, peers over her monitor. “Everything alright, Chad?”

“No, Sarah, everything is not alright,” he snaps, his voice dripping with condescension. “This reconciliation project is completely bugged. The source data is a joke. The algorithm is garbage. It keeps spitting out a seven figure deviation and I can’t find the source.”

Seven figures. My fingers stop their mindless clicking. A puzzle. A real one. A knot of interest tightens in my chest.

“A seven figure deviation?” Sarah asks, her eyebrows raised. “Which portfolio is it?”

“The OmniCorp merger acquisition data. It’s a complete disaster. It’s like trying to find one specific grain of sand on a beach made of numbers. It’s unsolvable.” He slams his mouse down on his desk. The sound makes a few people flinch.

He spends the next hour pacing behind his desk, muttering to himself and periodically sighing with dramatic frustration. He makes a series of loud, important sounding phone calls where he blames the data integrity team, the software developers, and a vague entity he calls ‘management’.

I finish the last binder just as my stomach growls. Lunch. I pull out the sad little sandwich I made this morning, a smear of peanut butter between two slices of cheap bread. I eat at my desk, watching Chad unravel.

He looks like a child on the verge of a tantrum, pouting at the screen that has bested him. He is all bluster and privilege, a man who has failed upward his entire life and has no idea how to actually solve a problem. And he’s in charge of a multi billion dollar merger’s data. The thought is terrifying.

And intriguing.

My mind is already working, turning the problem over. A seven figure deviation isn’t a typo. It’s systemic. It’s a flaw in the logic, a crack in the foundation. It’s a beautiful, elegant mistake buried somewhere in terabytes of data. My fingers twitch with the desire to find it.

“That’s it. I’m done.” Chad announces to the room at large. He grabs his suit jacket from the back of his chair. “My brain is fried. I’m going to get a drink. Or five. I’ll deal with this disaster in the morning.”

He glares at his desk. “Don’t anybody touch my workstation. I’ve got it bookmarked.”

He storms off toward the elevators without another word.

The tension in the air dissipates. People start to pack up their bags, the low murmur of end of day conversations filling the space.

“You finished that whole stack?”

I look up. It’s Sarah. She’s smiling at me. “Chad’s been putting that off for weeks. I’m impressed.”

“Thank you,” I say, my voice quiet. “It was…thorough.”

“Don’t let him get to you,” she says, lowering her voice. “His bark is much worse than his bite. And his bite is pretty clueless.” She winks, then heads for the door. “Have a good night.”

“You too.”

Soon, the floor is nearly empty. Only a few dedicated analysts remain, their faces illuminated by the glow of their screens. The city lights have begun to glitter outside, a sprawling galaxy of possibilities.

My eyes are drawn to Chad’s desk. To his triple monitors, still displaying rows and rows of mismatched numbers. The unsolvable problem.

My heart starts to beat faster.

This is a bad idea. A terrible, stupid, fireable idea. I should go home. I should call my mom, lie to her again, and try to figure out how to stretch thirty seven dollars until my first paycheck.

But the puzzle calls to me. It’s a song only I can hear. And the thought of Chad taking credit for someone else’s solution tomorrow, a solution he’ll have to beg some other department for, makes my teeth ache.

I stand up. My legs feel unsteady.

I walk across the plush carpet, the silence of the large room amplifying the sound of my own breathing. I slide into Chad’s expensive ergonomic chair. It’s still warm.

I move his mouse. The screen saver disappears, revealing the reconciliation software. It’s a mess. He has dozens of windows open, spreadsheets overlapping with raw data logs. It’s the digital equivalent of a panic attack.

I close everything, leaving just the core program. My fingers find the keyboard. I type in a command, pulling up the source code for the reconciliation algorithm.

Lines of code scroll past. It’s dense, but not particularly sophisticated. I can see the logic, the pathways the data is supposed to follow. My eyes scan, searching for the flaw. The misplaced variable. The incorrect operator. The recursive loop that feeds on itself.

And then I see it.

It’s so simple. So obvious. A rookie mistake. He’s using a floating point variable for a currency calculation in a critical part of the aggregation script. It’s introducing rounding errors. Tiny, infinitesimal errors that are invisible on a small scale. But when applied to millions of transactions, they cascade. They multiply. They grow into a seven figure monster.

A small, triumphant smile touches my lips. He would never have found this. He was looking for a single bad transaction, a needle in a haystack. But the problem wasn’t the needle. It was the hay.

My fingers fly across the keyboard. I don’t think. I just do. I rewrite the flawed section of the script. It takes less than five minutes. I define a new decimal variable, ensuring precision. I adjust the loop to reference the correct data type. It’s clean. It’s perfect.

I save the new script under a temporary file name. I don’t want to overwrite his work directly. That would be too easy to trace.

I run the reconciliation again with the corrected algorithm. The progress bar fills. My heart hammers against my ribs. This is either the moment I save the day or the moment I get escorted out by security.

The process completes.

I pull up the final report. I scroll to the bottom line.

Deviation: $0.00.

Balance confirmed.

A wave of pure, unadulterated satisfaction washes over me. It’s better than food. Better than sleep. It’s the beautiful, flawless click of a puzzle piece sliding into its rightful place.

I stare at the perfect zero on the screen. I did it. In under an hour, I solved the unsolvable problem.

But I can’t take the credit. Chad would never believe it. He’d accuse me of hacking, of sabotage. He’d find a way to make it my fault. No, this has to be his victory.

I open a simple text editor. I copy and paste the section of code I rewrote. I add a few comments, pointing to the original flaw and explaining the fix in the simplest possible terms. Terms even a fool like Chad could understand.

I print the code snippet and the final, balanced report. The printer on the other side of the room whirs to life, spitting out the two pages.

I walk over, retrieve the warm sheets of paper, and return to his desk. I log out of his workstation, leaving no trace of the programs I opened. I place the two pages squarely in the center of his keyboard.

No note. No name. Just the solution. Let him wonder where it came from. Let him believe it was a gift from the data gods.

I grab my purse from my own sad little desk and walk toward the elevators. The doors slide open with a soft chime. As I step inside, I catch my reflection in the polished steel. My eyes are bright, my cheeks are flushed. I look alive.

For the first time all day, I don’t feel like an imposter. I don’t feel like the charity case. I feel powerful.

The doors slide shut, and the elevator begins its silent descent. I just committed a major felony, or saved the company, or maybe both. I don’t know what will happen tomorrow. But as I step out into the cool night air, one thing is certain. I belong here. And they just don’t know it yet.

Chapter 3

Layla

The air in the elevator is stale. My own nervous breath. I clutch the strap of my purse, the broken clasp digging into my palm. Thirty seven dollars. The number is a permanent resident in my head now.

The elevator doors slide open onto the thirty fourth floor, and the difference is immediate. The air here isn't just air. It’s charged. There’s a buzz, a low hum of triumphant energy that wasn't here yesterday.

I see him immediately. Chad. He’s not at his desk. He’s holding court near the coffee machine, surrounded by three other senior analysts. He’s laughing, a loud, obnoxious sound that echoes in the cavernous space. He leans back, chest puffed out, a conquering hero returned from the war.

My heart sinks into my shoes. I walk toward my desk, trying to be invisible. My eyes dart to his workstation as I pass. The two sheets of paper I left on his keyboard are gone.

He didn't throw them away. I know he didn't. I can see it in the way he carries himself. He used them.

I slide into my chair and power on my computer, my hands trembling slightly. I stare at the screen, but the password field is just a blur. I feel a surge of nausea so powerful I have to grip the edge of my desk to steady myself.

“Team meeting in the main conference room in five, people!” a voice booms across the office. It’s Mr. Harrison, the department director. “Chad’s got something to show us.”

My blood runs cold.

I follow the herd of analysts into the glass walled conference room. The table is a long, polished slab of dark wood that reflects the city skyline like a still lake. I take a seat in the back, as far from the front as possible.

Chad stands next to the massive screen at the head of the table, clicking a presentation remote with an air of practiced ease. He looks every bit the part of a financial genius. Mr. Harrison stands beside him, beaming like a proud father.

“Alright, settle down, settle down,” Mr. Harrison says, his voice full of excitement. “As you all know, we’ve been hitting a wall with the OmniCorp reconciliation. A persistent seven figure deviation that nobody could crack. It was threatening to delay the entire merger.”

He claps a heavy hand on Chad’s shoulder. “But this young man here decided to burn the midnight oil. He didn’t just find the needle in the haystack. He rebuilt the entire haystack from the ground up.”

A murmur of impressed whispers ripples through the room. My stomach twists into a knot of pure acid.

Chad clears his throat, a smug little smile playing on his lips. “Thank you, Richard. It was really a matter of thinking outside the box. I realized everyone was looking at the problem from the wrong angle. They were looking for a transactional error.”

He clicks the remote. My code, the lines I wrote in his warm chair last night, appears on the screen. He’s copied it onto a slide.

“The problem wasn’t the transactions,” he continues, his voice smooth and confident. “It was systemic. An elemental flaw in the aggregation script itself. A floating point variable was being used for a currency calculation, creating cascading rounding errors.”

He’s reciting my notes. Word for word.

He walks the room through the fix, my fix, with a fluency that is almost believable. He uses words like ‘elegant’ and ‘robust’. My words. My solution. My beautiful, perfect zero.

“The result?” Chad clicks to the final slide. A screenshot of the balanced report. Deviation: $0.00. “Problem solved.”

Mr. Harrison is practically glowing. “This is exactly the kind of initiative I want to see from my senior team. Proactive. Innovative. Chad, you’ve saved us weeks of work and a hell of a lot of money. The board is going to be very pleased.”

The room erupts in applause. Polite at first, then genuinely enthusiastic. They’re clapping for him. For my work.

I feel my fingernails dig into my palms. My jaw is so tight it aches. I want to stand up. I want to scream. I want to wipe that self satisfied smirk right off his face. But I can't.

I am the intern. The scholarship kid with thirty seven dollars to my name and a sick sister. I am nothing. He is everything.

So I clap. I bring my hands together, the sound hollow and foreign. I am a ghost in the machine, watching a thief get crowned king.

After the meeting, the back patting continues. I slip out and retreat to the safety of my tiny desk. I stare at my screen, pretending to be absorbed in some meaningless task. I need to get my face under control. The fury is a hot, physical thing, and I'm afraid it’s showing.

“Hassan.”

His voice is right behind me. I flinch, then slowly turn in my chair.

Chad looms over my desk, a cup of coffee in his hand. He’s smiling down at me, a lazy, condescending curl of his lips.

“Good job on that scanning yesterday,” he says, his voice low enough that only I can hear. “Really… thorough.”

I just stare at him, my throat too tight to speak.

“Keeping the basics in order is what makes the big picture stuff, like what I just did, even possible,” he continues, taking a slow sip of his coffee. “It’s all part of the same machine. So, you know, thanks for your contribution.”

The insult is a masterclass in cruelty. He’s not just taking credit. He’s rubbing my face in it. He’s telling me I’m nothing more than a cog, a button pusher whose only purpose is to support his greatness.

My vision tunnels. All I can see is his smug face, his expensive watch, the life of ease he was born into and that I am fighting so desperately to earn a fraction of.

“You’re welcome, Chad,” I say. My voice is a ghost of a whisper, but it’s steady. I will not give him the satisfaction of seeing me break.

He gives me a final, dismissive nod and saunters back to his desk, the conquering hero returning to his throne.

I turn back to my monitor, my whole body trembling with a rage so profound it feels like it might tear me apart. I take a deep, shuddering breath. Then another. I need this job. I need this job. The words are a mantra, a prayer against the storm inside me.

“He’s a piece of work, isn’t he?”

The voice is soft, right next to my ear. I look up, startled. A young woman with dark, curly hair and kind eyes is standing by my desk, holding two mugs of coffee. She looks like another intern. Her blazer is nice, but not designer. She has a pen smudge on her cheek.

I don’t know what to say. Admitting anything feels like a risk.

She smiles, a knowing, slightly sad smile. “I’m Elena, by the way. I’m in the marketing department, but we all hear the finance gossip.” She extends one of the mugs to me. “This is for you. You look like you need it more than I do.”

I hesitate, then take the mug. It’s warm. “Layla. And… thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” she says, leaning against the filing cabinet. She lowers her voice. “That was quite a show in there. Chad’s a real genius, huh? Pulling an all nighter to crack the OmniCorp problem.”

Her tone is light, but her eyes are sharp, searching my face. I give a noncommittal shrug. “He’s a senior analyst.”

Elena takes a sip of her coffee, her gaze never leaving mine. “Let me guess. He had you on some mind numbing, pointless task yesterday, right? Kept you busy.”

I nod slowly, my heart starting to pound for a different reason.

“And I bet he was complaining all day about how unsolvable his project was,” she continues, her voice a low, confidential murmur.

I just look at her. I don’t have to say anything. She knows.

She sighs, shaking her head. “Don’t worry, you’re not the first. He did the same thing to Kevin last semester. An intern from my program. Kid was brilliant with market analysis. Chad had him running his personal errands for a month, then stole his entire quarterly projection report and passed it off as his own.”

The world tilts on its axis. “What… what happened to Kevin?”

Elena’s expression darkens. “They didn't extend his internship. Chad told Mr. Harrison that Kevin lacked initiative. Kevin got let go a week later. Now he’s working at his dad’s hardware store back in Ohio.”

My hands are cold. The warm mug does nothing to stop the chill spreading through me. This isn’t just about stolen credit. It’s about survival. Chad doesn't just take your work. He erases you.

“So,” Elena says, her voice soft but firm. “Be careful, Layla. This place is full of sharks. And Chad might be a fool, but he’s a dangerous one.”

She pushes off the filing cabinet. “It was nice to meet you. For real.” She gives me another small, sympathetic smile. “Hang in there.”

And then she’s gone, disappearing back into the maze of cubicles as quietly as she appeared.

I stare into my coffee. My reflection is a warped, pale stranger. An ally. I have an ally. But the comfort of that thought is smothered by the cold, hard reality of what she told me.

I’m not just fighting for credit anymore. I’m fighting for my spot. For my future. For the two hundred and forty three dollars my sister needs.

The rage inside me hasn’t gone away. But it’s changed. The hot, explosive anger has cooled, hardening into something else. Something solid and sharp.

I look over at Chad. He’s on the phone, laughing, spinning in his expensive chair. He thinks he’s won. He thinks I’m a nobody, a stepping stone he can crush without a second thought.

He’s wrong.

I take a sip of the coffee. It’s bitter. I welcome the taste. He might have won the battle today. But this is a war. And I have no intention of losing.