"Before you leave, it is important we talk about you being here."
Hephastian's voice was like a velvet dragged over gravel—smooth, yet possessing a hidden grit that could skin a person alive. He didn't look up immediately from the leather-bound folder on his desk, but the sheer gravity of his presence seemed to pull the oxygen toward him, leaving Ellie feeling breathless and small.
Ellie's breath hitched in her throat. She caught the slight, deliberate shift in his posture—the way his broad shoulders squared beneath his charcoal suit. It was a silent, predatory tell. The interview was about to take a turn she hadn't prepared for, moving away from corporate formalities and into a territory that felt uknown to her.
"Miss Powell, after reviewing your credentials, the company decided to off—"
"Whose spy are you?" Tevin's sharp voice sliced through Hephastian's words like a serrated blade.
Ignoring Hephastian's earlier dismissal, Tevin stepped closer to Ellie. The scent of her cloyingly sweet, expensive perfume—something floral and suffocating—hit Ellie once again before the woman did. Tevin's eyes, cold, forest-green, narrowed until they were thin slits of predatory intensity.
"Be honest," Tevin hissed, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial venom. "Otherwise, with a snap of my fingers, I will know everything about your pathetic little life, and I promise you, it won't be good for you. How did you manage to listen into our conversation? And Who sent you?"
"Tevin!"
Hephastian's voice dropped an octave, vibrating with a dark, dangerous anger that made the heavy mahogany furniture seem to rattle. "Should I remind you that this is an interview, not an interrogation? I will not have you waste any more of my time. You are trying my patience, and you know how little of it remains. Else..."
He let the sentence hang in the air, unfinished but heavy. It was a suffocating threat, the kind that made the very air in the room feel thin and metallic.
Tevin's expression shifted with a speed that was almost pathological. She smoothed her features into a mask of faux-innocence, her lips curving into a smile that didn't reach her eyes.
"Alright, Hephastian. I withdraw. I won't press the matter again," she said, her voice suddenly soft, her attitude shifting to something almost tender. "But I hope you won't mind me conducting the interview, since it was I who made the recommendation on her behalf in the first place."
Hephastian narrowed his eyes. The sudden change in her demeanor was suspicious, and the suggestion even more so.
He leaned back in his executive chair, the leather creaking under his weight, and watched Tevin with the detachment of a scientist observing a volatile chemical reaction.
Meanwhile, Ellie's mind became trapped in a suffocating whirlwind of thoughts. Tevin had recommended her? Why? She tried to comb through the archives of her memory, to atleast find a face, a name, a single interaction she might have had with this woman. But it was all blank and bleak.
How did she even know her name? Then, a dreadful thought whistled through her mind like a cold winter wind. It started as a baseless spark of suspicion but in time grew into a roaring flame of certainty. Could it really be him? The image of her ex-boyfriend, Jeffrey, flashed in her mind—his arrogant smirk, the way he looked down on anyone who he deemed fit to be a chess piece for his own amusement. Who else in her social circle had the capability of convincing a highborn like Tevin Aelholts to make such a move except a fellow highborn like him? No wonder, they shared the same venom in their eyes.
Apparently, Jeffrey hadn't let go; nor had he forgotten about her.
"Sure, she is all yours," Hephastian said, his curt acceptance dragging Ellie back to her senses.
Did he just agree? Ellie grew anxious, her heart hammered a frantic rhythm against her ribs. She could already foretell that her chances of clinching this job had narrowed to a razor's edge.
But beneath the fear, a new feeling was rising: a cold, hard resolve.
She was tired of being the girl Jeffrey could always break. She was done being a pawn in his high-born games. Clasping her envelope and her worn leather purse tightly until her knuckles turned a stark, bone-white, she prepared for battle. She would crush Tevin's schemes, or she would die trying. She wouldn't be Jeffrey's victim this time.
'Come on,' she challenged silently, meeting Tevin's gaze with a level stare. 'Bring it on.'
"Well, Miss Powell, where were we? Ah yes, the interview," Tevin remarked, her chin tilted so high she was looking down her nose. "Since we've started late, it is important you be brief. The Ceo has other important matters to attend to. So, tell us more about yourself."
Ellie took a deep, steadying breath, summoning every ounce of her education and her pride. She began to speak, her voice brimming with a hard-won certainty. She talked about her honors in university, her research into market volatility, and her vision for Emerson Corporations' expansion. She spoke with a brilliance that seemed to momentarily dim the opulence of the room.
"Your résumé sounds quite marvelous," Tevin interrupted, a cruel, shimmering glee in her eyes. "Truly. It's almost too perfect, isn't it? As if you rehearsed it before hand."
She paused, letting the insult linger before continuing. "Nevertheless, Emerson Corporations doesn't hire based on verbal flattery—especially in a unique situation like this where the company had to seek you out. It is imperative to validate your claims with original documents. Your degree, your certifications, your letters of recommendation. Do you have them?"
Tevin raised one of her perfectly arched, dark-colored eyebrows, her hand extended in an expectant, demanding gesture.
"Sure, Ma'am. I did bring them." Without a hint of suspicion, Ellie reached into her envelope. She produced the crisp, original papers—the physical evidence of four years of sleepless nights and sacrificed meals. "Here, have a look."
Tevin took the stack, her smile broadening into something predatory. For a moment, she seemed to be reading the top page—Ellie's Bachelor's degree with the gold-embossed seal. Then, in one swift, violent move, Tevin gripped the top of the papers and ripped the document apart.
Rrip!
The crackling sound of the tearing parchment roared in Ellie's ears like a landslide. Her eyes went wide, and her mind screeched to a halt. Tevin didn't stop there. She shredded the degree again, then the recommendation letters, and finally the portfolio. She worked with a manic, quiet intensity until the fragments were nothing but white litter, fluttering to the floor like funeral confetti.
The air in the room suddenly turned to ice. Ellie's lungs constricted, her throat closing up as if gripped by an invisible hand. A jagged, broken gasp escaped her lips as she reached for her chest. Her purse slipped from her fingers, hitting the floor with a dull thud that felt like the sound of her future being buried.
Everything she had worked for—every late night, every penny saved—was now trash on a shiny marble floor.
"I cannot allow a slut like you to work anywhere near my fiancé," Tevin grinned, her voice a triumphant hiss.
"Since you have not attained the basic requirements for employment at Emerson Corporations—which is, possessing an actual degree—you're disqualified. Please go back to the streets where you belong and look for the relevant documents. If you are lucky you will find them in a dumpster."
"Tevin Aelholts!"
Hephastian's voice wasn't just a roar; it was a physical force. He slammed his palms onto the mahogany desk, rising to his full, towering height. The air in the room seemed to vibrate with his pent-up fury.
"Why? I am your fiancé, reme—"
"Get. Out." Hephastian's words were clipped, each one a death sentence. "Don't press my buttons. I have given you enough face from the fact that you are the daughter of your father, but you have proved you are a cancer. You cannot change."
He stepped around the desk, his shadow falling over the room like an eclipse. "Need I remind you the contract at this point is already null and void and that the wedding is scrapped off? You have messed with my company more than enough and that's it. From now on if you wish to see how effective our security is at removing trespassers, be my guest. Be gone!"
"Is it because of an insufferable wench like her?" Tevin screamed, her face contorting into something ugly. She pointed her trembling, manicured finger at Ellie. "What's so good about this street whore? What have you seen in her that makes you embarrass me like this? She's nothing! She's a ghost from God knows where!"
The insults hit Ellie like a physical barrage, reverberating through her consciousness. That was it. This woman was bent to pull her into the mud. Not sparing her esteem and pride! Her mind short-circuited. The sight of Tevin's sneering face and the white scraps of her degree on the floor replayed in a sickening, slow-motion loop.
Suddenly, Ellie felt something cold and ancient take hold of her. She presumed it was the demon of darkness and destruction who had possessed her entire body. Whatever it was she didn't care. The fear was gone, replaced by a white-hot, singular focus. She didn't understand how it happened—she didn't care.
In a flash, she stood before Tevin.
CRACK.
A resounding slap echoed through the office. Tevin's head snapped to the side.
CRACK.
The second slap hit before Tevin could even scream.
CRACK.
The third blow crushed harder than the previous one. Tevin tumbled to the floor, her limbs tangling as she hit the shiny tiles like a dropped sack of flour.
A deafening, absolute silence fell over the room.
Ellie stood there, her chest heaving, her palm stinging with a fire that felt like the only real thing in the world. She didn't look at Hephastian. She also spared no glance at the sobbing woman at her feet.
Slowly, Ellie knelt down. Her body felt numb, her fingers trembling as she began to collect the sprawled pieces of paper. She picked up a jagged scrap that held the first three letters of her name. She then picked up the piece with the university seal. One scrap at a time, she gathered the wreckage of her life while hot, streaming tears pooled on the floor, reflecting her broken, unrecognizable image.
Hephastian, who had been watching the scene with a dark, unreadable surprise, slowly reached for the phone on his desk. He didn't step forward to help Tevin. He spared her not a single look. He simply stood, towering over both women with a condescending, glacial stare.
"Send security upstairs," he demanded, his voice aloof and professional. "We have a situation that needs... clearing."
Ellie ignored his words. She placed the fragments back into her envelope with a mechanical, obsessive neatness. She wasn't just picking up paper; she was gathering the shards of her soul. Once done, she rose to her feet, the envelope clutched to her chest like a shield.
She picked up her purse and walked toward the heavy oak door. She halted at the threshold, her hand on the cold brass handle. She took a breath and looked back over her shoulder. Her eyes were a terrifying, bloodshot red, her hair a wild mess, and her expression so haunted it sent a visible shiver through the room.
"As for the job," she whispered, her voice shaky but sharp enough to draw blood, "you can keep it for yourselves."
She opened the heavy oak door and slammed it shut.
The door bounced against its frame with a final, echoing boom, that swallowed Ellie's figure. The silence that rushed back into interview room was worse than the screaming had been. It was a vacuum, cold and sterile, filled only with the ragged, hitching breaths of Tevin Aelholts.
As for Ellie, she didn't stop to look back. She disappearing into the long, sterile hall of the Emerson empire. Here, she paid no heed at the sleek, glass-walled cubicles where dozens of Emerson employees had stopped their work, their mouths agape, watching the interviewee march past with fire in her eyes and a crumpled envelope held to her heart. She felt their stares like needles against her skin, but she didn't care. The demon that had possessed her was receding, leaving behind a cold, trembling void and a palm that throbbed with every beat of her heart.
Inside the office, Hephastian didn't move. He stood against his mahogany fortress, his eyes fixed on the door where Ellie Powell had just vanished. His expression was a mask of granite, but if one looked closely, the muscle in his jaw was ticking.
Tevin let out a sharp, indignant wail from the floor, her hand clutched her reddening cheek. "Did you see that? Hephastian! That... that peasant assaulted me! I want her arrested! I want her destroyed!"
Hephastian finally turned his gaze toward the woman he was supposed to marry. It wasn't a look of sympathy. It was a look of pure, unadulterated loathing.
"You reaped what you sow, Miss Tevin," he said, his voice so low it was a growl. "And it is the high time you should stop messing around. You have already done more than enough damage."
The chime of the private elevator on the side of the room signaled the arrival of security. Three large men in tactical suits stepped into the room, their eyes darting between the disheveled heiress on the floor and their employer.
"Sir?" the lead officer asked.
Hephastian gestured vaguely toward Tevin. "Escort Miss Aelholts to her vehicle. Ensure she leaves the premises immediately. If she sets foot on this floor again, consider it a security breach of the highest order. Greet her Father on my behalf. Tell him she did that to herself." "Yes sir!" The security chorused in unison. They understand what that meant.
"Hephastian you—!" Tevin's voice was cut off as the guards firmly, but professionally, helped her to her feet and steered her toward the exit.
When the room was finally empty, Hephastian walked over to the spot where Ellie had knelt. He looked down. She had been meticulous, but she had missed one tiny sliver of paper. He reached down, his long fingers plucking the scrap from the marble.
It was a fragment of her recommendation letter. It contained only three words: "...extraordinary resilience under..."
A slow, dark smile—the first of the day—tugged at the corner of Hephastian's mouth. He didn't throw the scrap away. Instead, he tucked it into his breast pocket, right over his heart.
"Resilience," he whispered to the empty room. "How interesting. "
He walked back to his desk and pressed a button on his intercom.