Chapter Six: Stability or Love

“Follow me. Bring your notebook.”

Dominic doesn’t slow as he passes the reception area. 

Rhea barely has time to nod before handing the iPad to Julian. Tessa’s smile flickers with a sharp, hungry curiosity, but Rhea is already moving, her heels clicking rhythmically against the marble as she struggles to keep pace at Dominic’s side. 

Her steps are quick, her movements tightly controlled.

He ushers her into the private sanctuary of his office and shuts the door with a quiet, terrifying finality. Before she can even turn, he draws her into him. 

Her back slams against his chest, his arm locking around her waist like a steel band. His breath ghosts across the sensitive skin of her neck, sending a shiver of pure, cold electricity down her spine.

“Show me today’s brief.”

His voice is level, devoid of the heat from the boardroom. That is what unsettles her most. The lack of emotion means he is in total control.

Rhea breaths nervously. “I couldn’t…I wasn’t able to write much, sir.”

Her hand lifts toward her glasses out of habit - a nervous tic - then freezes in mid-air. She remembers. The suffocating heat of the meeting. The warning.

“Do that again,” he murmurs, his lips brushing her earlobe, “and I will rip that dress off your body.”

Her breath stutters, her heart hammering against her ribs.

“Read,” he commands.

Rhea swallows the lump in her throat and opens the notebook with trembling fingers. “A product that shifts how Axiom defines performance,” she begins. Her voice is barely above a whisper, thin and fragile.

She feels him move behind her. His hand bunches the fabric of her dress, lifting it until the cool office air hits her bare thighs.

“For eighteen months… Ahh!” Her words falter into a soft, broken moan as his fingers find her.

“Continue.”

His tone doesn’t change, but the air in the room does. It tightens. It narrows until the entire world is reduced to the friction of his touch.

“For eighteen months,” she forces out, her eyes blurring over her own handwriting, “engineering, data analytics, and marketing aligned around a single objective…”

Her grip tightens on the notebook, the paper crinkling under her pressure. Her thoughts are a smudge of ink. She knows she is losing her grip on her composure, and she knows that he enjoys the unraveling.

He finds the center of her heat, his thumb beginning to stroke her in a slow, agonizingly circular motion.

“Focus, Fragile,” Dominic says softly.

The word lands like a physical weight, a demand for a perfection she cannot give.

Rhea’s breath comes in shallow, desperate gasps. “To anticipate the driver. Not... not just respond to them.”

Suddenly, Dominic reaches around, his other hand pinning her against him as he pinches her nipple sharply through the fabric of her dress.

“Mr. Ashcroft!” Rhea lets out a sharp, jagged moan, her knees buckling under the dual assault of pain and pleasure. She shudders, her body folding into his.

“Do you know you are being loud enough for Julian and Tessa to hear?” he whispers, his voice a dark taunt.

Without warning, he drives two fingers into her.

Rhea leans back into him, her head thumping against his shoulder. She shivers, her legs feeling like they have turned to water, invisible and useless. 

Goodness gracious, how she wants this. 

She wants the lie of the office to drop away. She wants him to take her right there, until the name Axiom is the last thing on her mind.

But Dominic’s presence shifts. He pulls back abruptly.

The space he leaves behind is loud…deafening. The sudden cold is more violent than his touch.

“That will do.”

She doesn’t move at first, her body still vibrating with the echo of his fingers.

Dominic reaches out and straightens her dress. His hands are precise and impersonal as he resets her, smoothing the fabric and restoring her order as if she is nothing more than a wrinkled suit. He is erasing the evidence of his own transgression.

“You may go.”

Rhea nods once, the motion too quick, too desperate. She clutches the notebook to her chest like a shield as she slips past him and escapes through the door.

She doesn't look back. She doesn't need to. The consequence is already living inside her, a steady, pulsing reminder that even when he is finished with her, she is never truly free.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Rhea stares at the spreadsheet glowing on her monitor, numbers blurring as her thoughts drift far from the reports and projected costs.

It feels like she’s sold pieces of herself to Dominic Ashcroft. Not openly. Not officially. But in ways that matter more.

He has access to her time, her attention, her reactions. To her body, whenever he decides to close the distance between them.

And she isn’t sure whether that realization unsettles her…or thrills her.

At thirty-four, being reduced to something like a possession especially to a man younger than her should disgust her. 

She wants something real. Something steady. Not the ache that coils in her stomach every time his voice drops, every time his touch lingers just long enough to make her want more.

Yet that’s the problem.

He never goes further.

He draws her in, leaves her wanting, then steps back as if restraint itself is a weapon.

Is that control?

Or punishment?

She exhales slowly, fingers tightening against the edge of her desk.

Why her?

Why not someone younger, closer to his age or someone easier to dominate without resistance? The question nags at her more than she wants to admit.

Maybe it’s because it’s been too long since anyone touched her that way.

“A penny for your thoughts.”

Julian’s voice pulls her back. He rolls his chair closer, an easy smile on his face.

Rhea returns it faintly. “Personal issues.”

“Home?” he asks gently.

She nods.

There’s a pause before he says, “Would you like to go to a concert with me this weekend? I’ve got an extra ticket.”

She blinks, surprised.

Then she smiles. “Sure.”

The word feels lighter than it should.

She needs this. Someone who isn’t Dominic Ashcroft. 

Someone without secrets and sharp edges. Someone who doesn’t make her moan loudly in board meetings or look at her like she’s something he already owns.

“Really?” Julian asks, clearly caught off guard. “That was easy.”

“Well,” she says, turning toward him, “I’m free. And it wouldn’t hurt to go out. Just… have fun.”

Julian grins.

He would be easy. Kind. Safe.

Around her age or slightly older. Stable. The kind of man you build something real with.

Not like Dominic who is all restraint and authority, rough edges and unreadable intent.

Rhea turns back to her screen, forcing herself to focus.

Maybe Julian could be something real. Something solid.

Something that belongs to her.

And maybe, just maybe, she can keep that part of her life separate from the contract she signed in silence with her boss.

She needs financial stability.

She needs love security.

And right now, she needs both kinds.

She just doesn’t know which one will claim her first.