EVE'S POV
The elevator ride down was quiet.
I stood beside him and focused very hard on the doors.
He had his hands in his pockets, looking completely unbothered, which was honestly a little unfair given that my heart was doing something mildly unprofessional in my chest.
This was dinner.
Work dinner, I reminded myself. Completely normal. Bosses took assistants to dinner all the time.
The doors opened.
He stepped out and I followed, nearly catching my heel on the elevator threshold.
Smooth, Eve.
Outside the night air was cool. His car was already waiting.
He opened the passenger door.
I blinked at it for a second.
"You don't have a driver?" I asked.
He looked at me.
"Get in," he said.
I got in.
The restaurant was the kind of place I would never have found on my own. Quiet. Tucked away. Low lighting and the kind of menu that didn't have prices on it which either meant very expensive or extremely very expensive.
The hostess greeted him like she had been expecting him specifically.
We were seated immediately.
I looked around the restaurant trying not to look like I was looking around and probably failing.
"Have you been here before?" he asked.
"No," I said. "It's lovely though." I paused. "Very quiet."
"I like quiet."
"Me too," I said. Then immediately wondered if that sounded like I was just agreeing with him. "I mean — I do actually. Like quiet. That wasn't just.."
"I know," he said. Something in his expression shifted slightly. Not quite a smile. "You talk when you're nervous."
I looked at him.
"I'm not nervous."
He picked up his menu.
"Okay," he said.
I picked up mine.
I was a little nervous.
We ordered. The food came. And somewhere between the starter and the main course something loosened between us , the way it does when two people stop performing and just exist in the same space for a while.
He asked about the filing system I had reorganized in my second week. I explained my logic behind it and he listened properly, not the way people listen when they're waiting for you to finish, but actually following.
"That's not how it was set up originally," he said.
"I know. The original system made sense for about fifty files. You have three hundred. It needed rethinking."
He was quiet for a moment.
"You didn't ask."
"You weren't there that day," I said. "And it needed doing."
He looked at me.
"And if I had disagreed with your approach?"
"Then I would have changed it back," I said simply. "But I didn't think you would."
"Why."
"Because it's better," I said. "And you care about things working properly more than you care about who thought of it."
Something shifted in his expression.
He reached for his glass.
"You've been watching me," he said.
"You're my boss," I said. "It's literally my job to anticipate what you need."
"Most assistants don't think that deeply about it."
"Most assistants probably last longer than three weeks before reorganizing the entire filing system," I said.
He almost laughed.
Not quite. But it was the closest I had seen.
"Fair," he said.
We ate for a while without talking and it wasn't uncomfortable. The restaurant moved quietly around us.
"Why this job?" he asked eventually.
I looked up.
"Sorry?"
"You're clearly capable of more than managing someone's schedule," he said. "So why this."
I considered how much of the truth to give him.
"I needed to learn something," I said. "And I figured the fastest way to learn it was to be close to someone who already knew it."
He held my gaze.
"And have you. Learned it."
"I'm still learning," I said honestly.
He nodded slowly. Like that was the right answer.
The evening wound down gradually. Neither of us rushed it.
When we finally walked out the night had gone properly dark and cool.
He dropped me off outside my building, the car idling quietly.
I gathered my bag and reached for the door.
"Thank you for dinner," I said. "I mean it."
He nodded once.
I got out.
I was almost at the building entrance when I heard it. Low. Unhurried.
"Good night, lil cat."
I stopped.
Turned slightly.
But the car was already pulling away.
I stood there for a second.
Then I smiled.
Walked inside.
And told myself very firmly that smiling about it was not something I was going to be doing.
I did it anyway.