Lahat ng Kabanata ng Sweet Revenge, Mr. CEO: Kabanata 91 - Kabanata 98

Serena's POVThe boardroom was cold, smelled of leather polish, and sat twenty stories above the city.By eight-forty-five, the massive glass table was surrounded by senior board members and regional department heads. At the far end sat David, reviewing a stack of printed reports with a pen clamped between his teeth.I took my seat near the middle of the table, setting my notebook down next to my coffee cup.Killian walked in two minutes later.He had adjusted his hair, but he couldn't hide the tension in his neck or the way his suit jacket sat a little stiffly on his broad shoulders. He walked straight to the head of the table, avoiding my gaze completely as he pulled out his chair and sat down."Let's begin," Killian said, his voice flat and clear. "We have three items on the agenda today. The first is the status of the regional expansion."David sat up, tapping his pen on the desk. "I can take that, Killian. Given the recent delays and Elena's health issues, my team has drafted a r

Killian's POVMy office felt claustrophobic by eight-thirty.I stood behind my desk, my coat tossed over the back of the leather chair, staring down at the tablet in my hand. On the screen was a flagged internal transfer order of five-million-dollar wire allocation routed through our secondary holding branch in Zurich, set to execute before the opening bell.It carried my digitized signature. Except I hadn't signed it.The doors of my office swung open without a knock. David walked in, his tailored jacket unbuttoned, carrying a dark leather folder tucked under his arm. He looked entirely too calm for a man who had just convened an unannounced meeting with our internal auditors forty-five minutes ago."You're early," David said, shutting the door behind him with a sharp click. "I thought you were taking the morning off to handle things at home.""Cancel the Zurich transfer, David," I said, my voice dangerously low. I didn't look up from the tablet screen. "Right now."David paused mid-

Serena’s POVI’d imagined that it would take a while for the silence in the car to break. But we’d only gone a few miles when Vivian turned slightly in her seat, resting her arm over the headrest to look back at me. Her dark eyes were bright, tracking my face with an intensity that belied her slurred words.Vivian shifted in her seat and turned slightly, one arm resting over the headrest as she looked at me. Whatever haze she’d been wrapped around when we first saw her seemed to have faded, her eyes bright with curiosity. “So,” she said, her voice warm enough to sound casual, “what did the doctor actually tell you today, Elena?”“Nothing conclusive.” I folded my hands over the pharmacy bag resting on my lap. “They’re still trying to work out what’s causing everything. Until then, they’ve told me to stay off the road.”“Oh.” She frowned sympathetically. “Does that mean you won’t be coming back to Rhodes Inc. for a while?”“I hadn’t planned on disappearing for long,” I replied. “I’ll

Serena’s POVKillian’s car rolled to a stop along the curb outside our destination. And for several seconds after the engine went quiet, neither of us reached for the door.Killian remained behind the wheel, one hand resting loosely against it while the other tapped once, then twice, against his thigh before falling still again. He drew in a breath, as though rehearsing something in his mind.“Elena.”His voice was more restrained than before, almost swallowed by the sound of the rain.I turned toward him.He didn’t meet my eyes immediately. Instead, he looked through the rain-streaked windshield toward the entrance of the lounge before finally glancing in my direction.“You don’t have to come inside,” he said. “You can stay here. I’ll only be a few minutes.”There was nothing unusual about the words themselves.It was everything around them.The hesitation before he spoke. The careful way he chose each sentence. The fact that he sounded as though he was trying to solve a problem th