Anita George stood behind the floor-to-ceiling windows of her corner office, thirty-five stories above a city that pulsed with ambition and deceit. The skyline shimmered in the dying light of day—golden hues streaking through glass and steel. Below, the world moved fast. But up here, everything was under her control. Or so she thought.
Her reflection in the window looked immaculate: a tailored black suit, hair pinned in a sleek chignon, and a calm, commanding gaze. The image of success. But just beneath the surface, something had shifted. It had been for weeks now—a scent of something rotten in the air, too faint to name, but impossible to ignore.
"Ms. George," her assistant's voice crackled through the intercom. "He's here."
Anita didn't respond right away. Instead, she turned from the window slowly, her heels clicking softly against the marble floor. He's here. As if she hadn't felt him enter the building—her skin always tightened slightly in his presence, a reaction she once mistook for love.
"Send him in," she said.
Marcus Delaney walked in with the confidence of a man who believed he belonged anywhere. Tall, lean, impeccably dressed. The man she had once trusted not only with her business, but her heart. His smile was warm, but his eyes betrayed him—they darted, unsure. It was subtle. Most wouldn't have noticed. But Anita wasn't most.
"You're early," she said, walking to her desk, placing a hand on the stack of contracts she'd reviewed since dawn.
"I missed you," Marcus replied, stepping closer than necessary.
The words fell flat, like a rehearsed line in a play he no longer believed in.
Anita studied him. He used to disarm her. Now he only made her calculations sharper. "Cut the charm, Marcus. You didn't come early to flirt. So what do you want?"
His smile faltered for the briefest second. "I have a business opportunity."
Of course you do, she thought.
It was in that moment—a glance at the folder in his hand, the faint scent of another woman's perfume clinging to his suit—that Anita knew. She didn't have proof, not yet. But instinct had never failed her.
She would play along. For now.
"Let's hear it," she said coolly, sitting down and motioning for him to begin.
As he opened the folder and began to speak, Anita watched him carefully—not as a lover, not even as a partner—but as a threat.
Outside, the city lights flickered on. Night had fallen. And with it, so had the first stone in the glass fortress she had spent a lifetime building.