ANMELDENSoren ignored the dead phone weighing heavy in his pocket, and drove straight to the Velvet Exchange, his grip tight on the steering wheel.
He no longer wanted to wait for any technician. The frustration boiling inside him needed an outlet, and that outlet was Elena.
When he entered the suite, the sight that greeted him made his blood run hot.
Elena stood near the door, dressed nicely in a modest bu
Elena ended the call with trembling fingers, and fisted her hands at her sides in a desperate attempt to calm her nerves, while her heart hammered so violently she could feel it in her throat.Slowly, she turned to look at Soren again, only to find him striding toward her with an unreadable expression.Elena stood up and began to move backward until her back suddenly hit the cold wall. She glanced at it in panic, then turned back to face him. In the space of a heartbeat, he was already standing right in front of her."What are you..." Elena began, but trailed off as soon as Soren placed both hands on the wall beside her head, caging her in.His tall frame towered over her, his dark eyes locked onto hers with dangerous intensity.“What were you doing with my laptop?” he asked, his voice low and calm.“I was… I saw&h
Soren had left hours ago for what he claimed was a series of back-to-back meetings downtown, but his cologne still lingered faintly in the air like a taunting reminder of his presence.Elena had the place to herself, or so she thought.She stared at the spare laptop which was on the glass table in the living area, its screen was dark but the power light blinked softly, as if inviting her closer.A thought suddenly slipped into her mind. The night before, Soren had mentioned casually that he needed a secondary device for personal notes while his main one was being serviced."Maybe it's one, but why did he leave it here?" Elena thoughts, staring at it in disbelief.Her instincts screamed it was a trap, but the ticking clock in her mind drowned out the warning.Forty-eight hours.That was all her b
The next morning, Elena woke up with a heavy heart.The events of the previous night still lingered, Sandra’s cruel words, Soren’s conflicted touch, and the almost-kiss that had left her shaken.She reached for her phone, which had been returned to her under strict conditions, and saw an urgent encrypted message from her boss, Mr. Harlan.The message was short and brutal:"48 hours. Steal concrete evidence — documents, recordings, access to Soren's private files or communications. If you fail, the investigation is terminated and you will be pulled out immediately. No extensions. This is your last chance.”Elena’s stomach dropped. She sat up in bed, her heart beating rapidly against her chest.The investigation was everything, her career, her purpose, her only way out of this nightmare.
Soren ended the call and tossed the phone onto the couch.He turned to face her fully, his expression unreadable. Elena took an instinctive step back, her mind racing with desperate questions she didn’t dare voice aloud.Without uttering another word, he turned on his heel and stormed out of the suite, clenching his fists tightly as the image of Elena burned in his chest.Soren entered his car and drove back to his house in silence. Once he's inside, he poured himself a glass of drink and sat down at his desk.The security feed from the Velvet Exchange suite was still live on his laptop. Soren fast-forwarded through the footage, watching Elena move around the room after he had left.She paced restlessly at first, then froze, glancing around nervously as if she could sense invisible eyes on her.What happened next made Sor
Soren stared at Elena in silence, the battle inside him reaching a fever pitch. Every instinct screamed for him to punish her, to break through the web of secrets she kept spinning.But another, quiet voice whispered that she was becoming more than just revenge. She was becoming an obsession he could no longer control.“Soren… I…” Elena began, her voice barely above a whisper, trembling with the weight of everything she couldn’t say.Before she could find the courage to continue, Soren’s phone vibrated sharply on the side table. He glanced at the screen, his expression darkening. It was a message from Sandra with a video attachment.His blood ran cold as soon as he finished watching the video.A video of Elena at the café that evening, sitting with her boss, Harlan. The footage had been edited cleverly to remo
Soren stood in the middle of the suite, with his arms crossed, watching Elena change back into the thin silk robe.When she's done, she stepped back into the room, looking innocent as always, but that expression did nothing to Soren's hardened heart.He had promised himself he would be harsher today, and that's what he's going to do.“On your knees,” he ordered.Elena obeyed, lowering herself to the floor. Her hands trembled as she placed them on her thighs.Soren began to circle her slowly, the sound of his footsteps echoing in the room.He was about to start the new rules, when a sharp knock sounded at the door. Soren's frown deepened.No one was supposed to interrupt him here. He'd given a strict instruction, then who the hell was it?He ignored and decided to continue, but the
Elena stood frozen in the center of the suite, her phone clutched so tightly her knuckles ached. Mr. Godfrey's reply had come almost instantly earlier. "Tomorrow, 2 p.m. The Meridian Club, private lounge. I’ll have a table reserved."But then, the rules of the Velvet Exchange were ironclad. No le
The conference room on the forty-seventh floor of Vale Technologies smelled of fresh coffee, and expensive cologne of powerful men, but Soren Vale barely noticed.He sat at the head of the obsidian table, fingers steepled, his expression locked in the detached authority that had made seasoned inves
Elena paced about the room restlessly, her arms wrapped tightly around her middle as though she could hold herself together that way.The thin robe they’d left for her, slipped off one shoulder with every sharp turn she made, but she didn’t bother to fix it.His voice looped in her skull, calm and
Her heart sank instantly as she glanced at the wall across from her, where a single framed article hung crookedly, the one she'd written ten years ago. The headline was faded now, but she could still read it even in her sleep."Tech Prodigy's Empire Crumbles: Insider Claims Fraud."She'd been twen







