Chapter 2 - The Crimson LedgerBy three o'clock that afternoon, Marcus Vance was clearing his desk into a cardboard box while security guards stood on either side of him. His face was the color of a bruised plum as he was escorted past the rows of gray cubicles.

Harper hadn’t looked up from her screen until Vance slammed his box onto an empty chair near her pod.

“This is your fault,” Vance hissed, pointing a trembling finger at her. “You and your little smart remarks. I don't know who you’re sleeping with in upper management, Lane, but you’re going to burn for this.”

Before Harper could form a reply, the private elevator at the end of the hall—the one that never opened for anyone below vice-presidential rank—chimed.

The heavy steel doors parted.

Adrian Crowe stepped out.

The entire fourteenth floor went dead silent. The frantic clicking of keyboards ceased instantly. Employees shrank back into their ergonomic chairs, desperate to become invisible. Adrian walked with a terrifying, unhurried grace, his charcoal suit catching the harsh fluorescent light.

He didn’t look at Vance. He didn’t look at the trembling department heads who had rushed out of their glass offices to greet him.

He walked straight to Harper’s desk.

Harper slowly turned around in her mesh chair, blinking behind her wire-rimmed glasses.

“Mr. Logistics,” she whispered. “Did you miss your floor?”

“No,” Adrian said, his gaze fixed entirely on her. “I came to inspect the new office.”

“The... what?”

Adrian gestured with a gloved hand toward the corner office—the spacious, glass-walled suite that had belonged to Marcus Vance for five years, complete with a private view of the Baltimore harbor and an executive leather chair.

“Your promotion, Ms. Lane. Effective immediately.”

Harper stared at him, then glanced at the corner office, then back at Adrian. She stood up slowly, her canvas bag sliding off her shoulder and hitting the carpet with a soft thud.

“Are you out of your mind?” she demanded, loud enough for half the floor to hear. “I’ve been here for eight months! I’m three months away from finishing my probationary period! I don’t want an office, I don’t want a team, and I definitely don’t want whatever corporate witchcraft just happened to Marcus!”

Cole, standing two steps behind Adrian, winced. She’s dead, his posture screamed. No one talks to him like that.

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Adrian didn’t blink. Instead, a faint, dangerous smile touched the corners of his mouth—a smile no living soul outside his inner circle had seen in a decade.

“Then consider it a hostile takeover,” Adrian said smoothly. “Pack your blueberry muffin, Ms. Lane. Your new office has a much better view of the light rail delays.”