Lahat ng Kabanata ng The Heiress's Choice : Kabanata 31 - Kabanata 40

Elena's POV"Patricia, I need everything we have on the European expansion deal, now!"I slammed my office door so hard the glass shook. Patricia jumped at her desk, looking like she might cry."Miss Sterling, I...""Everything, Patricia," I cut her off, dropping my bag on my desk, "Contracts, emails, meeting notes, all of it, and I need the board meeting minutes from the last six months.""All of them?""Did I stutter?She shook her head fast and turned to her computer, fingers flying across the keyboard as her life depended on it.I started pacing behind my desk, my heart racing so fast I thought it might explode. Catherine's face was still burned into my brain, that smug smile, those calculating eyes.How did this happen? How did she just waltz back into my company?“Here," Patricia rushed in with a stack of folders, "These are the expansion files, I'm still pulling the meeting minutes.""Fine, leave those and get out."She practically ran back to her desk.I grabbed the first fol

Elena's POV"Wait, look at this."Damien leaned forward, his finger tracing a line in one of the contracts spread across my desk. We'd been at this for maybe twenty minutes now, sitting across from each other in silence, searching for a solution. Anything.The only sounds were the soft rustle of paper and the low hum of the air conditioner overhead. The office felt completely cut off from the world outside, just us and these endless documents between us. "What?" I asked, rubbing my eyes, trying to force the words on the page to stop blurring together."Catherine's not trying to take direct control," he said slowly, like he was figuring it out as he spoke. "Look at the wording here, she's not positioning herself as the decision maker."Something in his tone made me sit up straighter."Then what's she doing?"He leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling for a second, his jaw tight."She's setting you up to fail," he said finally, "She doesn't need control, she needs you to look

Damien's POVI stood there in her office staring at the door she'd just walked through, my heart still racing from that kiss.I couldn't hold it back anymore. It's been weeks of keeping my distance and giving her space and trying to be the man she needed me to be. But all it took was one moment of her looking at me like that, and I just snapped.I kissed her like I'd been dying to since forever, which I had. From the moment she walked on that stage at the gala.I pressed my fingers to my lips, still tasting her.“This can't happen again,” that's what she said.But she'd kissed me back, her fingers tangled in my hair, and she'd made that sound…I rubbed my hand over my face and looked at the mess of papers covering her desk. We'd been up all night working through Catherine's game, and I was completely exhausted.My eyes burned, my back ached from hunching over documents for hours, and I was pretty sure I'd had enough coffee to kill a smaller man.I grabbed my jacket off the back of

Elena's POV "Another round?"Maya held up the wine bottle, waving it toward my glass. Her smile was easy and relaxed as she looked around at everyone gathered on the deck.I nodded and held out my glass, watched her pour, the red liquid catching the light from the deck lamps, even though I knew I shouldn't.My head was already tipsy, and everything felt too close and too loud.The kids were finally asleep below deck, which meant the adults had taken over, drinks flowing freely as we sat around in a loose circle under the stars.Damien was sitting across from me, beer in hand, forced into the group now that Ethan wasn't around to rescue him.He looked uncomfortable, his posture stiff as he nursed a beer and tried to follow along with Adrian's friend's story about some golf tournament.Adrian was being civil, barely, shooting Damien the occasional tight smile that didn't reach his eyes.Maya had made him promise to behave, and he was keeping that promise, but just barely.Jenna was sit

Elena's POV As sunlight streamed through the cabin window straight into my face, the first thought that hit me the second I opened my eyes was the kiss.I groaned and rolled over, burying my face in the pillow.But the memory from last night was already there, impossible to ignore.I remembered his hands sliding under my pajama top, his mouth on my neck, the way I'd gasped when he pulled me closer, gripping my hips.The heat of it, the way my entire body had been on fire.Then we got interrupted.It was a sound from somewhere on the deck, footsteps or something shifting, I didn't know what it was.But it was loud enough to make us both freeze, breaking apart like we were caught doing something illegal.I turned around without saying a word and practically ran back to my cabin, my heart pounding so hard I thought it might burst out of my chest.Now, lying here in the morning light, sober and awake, I waited for the regret to hit me.It didn't come.I wasn't ashamed. I was embarrassed