Chapter Three

4 hours earlier

In a spotless, brightly lit office, a man stood at the ceiling to floor window that overlooked the entire city. His tall, straight body gave off a deep aura of someone not to be crossed. The city below moved in its usual frenzy, cars crawling like insects, people too small to matter from this height. He watched it all with the detached interest of a man who had long since decided that the world beneath him existed solely for his convenience.

He brought his hands to his mouth, in between his fingers was a cigar. He took a deep drag of it and turned to look at the person standing in his office.

"Everything's done right?" he said to the person in the office, his voice deep and menacing.

"Yes Mr. Blake, here's the marriage certificate. The judge sends his greetings too." The man being addressed said as he brought out the certificate and placed it on the large table in the office.

Jaxon crossed the room in measured steps and picked up the certificate. He looked it over slowly, turning it slightly in his hands as if checking it for flaws. There were none. He had made sure of that. Every detail of this arrangement had been handled precisely. Every loose end tied before it could unravel.

"Tell me about my wife, Kyle," Jaxon said with a smirk as he walked towards the table to pick up the marriage certificate.

Kyle straightened slightly. He had worked for Jaxon long enough to know that when his employer smirked, it was never a good sign for whoever was on the receiving end of it.

"She's like a little rabbit," Kyle responded without any emotions. "Scared but will bite if cornered."

A quiet laugh left Jaxon. Not warm. Nothing about Jaxon Blake was warm. It was the kind of laugh that carried no humor, only satisfaction at a plan coming together exactly as designed.

"A little rabbit." He repeated the words slowly, as if tasting them. He looked at Savannah's signature on the certificate, his face bare of any emotions. Small. Slightly unsteady, like the pen had trembled in her hand. He ran his thumb across it once. "How fitting."

He set the certificate down.

"You can leave now. Tell Kim to come here on your way out."

Kyle nodded and walked out of Jaxon's office. He saw Kim, one of Jaxon's secretaries, and relayed the message without looking at her twice.

Kim smoothed the imaginary wrinkle on her short skirt and unbuttoned the first button on her shirt. Smiling haughtily, she walked towards Jaxon's office with her head high while earning scornful looks from her other colleagues.

"Who does she think she is? Just because the boss is lenient these days, she thinks she can seduce him."

"I must say I admire her confidence. Not everyone can be bold enough to approach the boss so blatantly like that."

Stella, an assistant to Jaxon, murmured mockingly and rolled her eyes at Kim's swaying hips. The other girls exchanged glances and returned to their screens. They had seen women like Kim before. They never lasted long.

Kim knocked once and pushed the door open before waiting for a response.

"You called me sir." She walked close to Jaxon's chair, her hips swaying seductively like a dancer. She looked at Jaxon in expectation, hoping for him to acknowledge her. To look at her the way men always looked at her. She had dressed carefully for exactly this moment.

"Who gave you permission to enter without knocking."

It wasn't a question. Jaxon's voice landed flat and cold and Kim felt it like a drop in temperature. Even without looking at her, his voice carried a powerful authority that could easily frighten people. She had heard stories about his temper. She had convinced herself she was different. Standing here now, she wasn't so sure.

"I... I didn't know. I'm sorry sir, it won't happen again."

Her stuttering made Jaxon frown. He finally decided to look at her. His face was bare of any expression but his eyes conveyed a deadly intensity. The kind that didn't shout. The kind that simply observed and calculated and decided.

"Miss Jenkins," he said slowly. "Do you know why I invited you to my office?"

"No sir." She kept her chin lifted. Kept her composure, barely.

"At Roger's party, my drink was spiked." He leaned back in his chair and crossed one leg over the other. Unhurried. Completely in control. "And if not for my quick thinking, I'd have been a victim of sexual assault. Wouldn't that be laughable?"

Kim's heart started beating rapidly. There was no way he could have known she had told one of the servers to drug him. She had been careful. She had used a middleman. She had covered every step. Maintaining a calm face, she tried to appear surprised.

"I didn't know about that sir." Her voice came out steadier than she expected. She held onto that.

Jaxon watched Kim's resolute stance for a long moment. He said nothing. The silence stretched and Kim resisted the urge to fill it. Then without a word, he turned his laptop towards her.

A video was playing on the screen.

Kim watched in horror as her scheming was exposed in clear, unforgiving detail. The timestamp. The server. Her own face in a corridor she thought had no cameras. Her voice, low and conspiratorial, giving instructions she had been certain would never be traced back to her.

"I... I can ex... explain sir." Her voice cracked this time. The composure she had walked in with was dissolving quickly and she had no way to stop it.

"Go on." Jaxon picked up a cigarette from the case on his desk and lit it. He leaned back and watched her with the patience of a man who had nowhere more important to be. "I'd like to hear why you entered the hotel room I was in and attempted to take advantage of me."

"I'm sorry Mr. Blake." The tears came quickly, streaking through her carefully applied makeup. "Please forgive me. I promise I won't do it again. I wasn't thinking clearly, I just... please."

Jaxon took a slow drag of the cigarette and exhaled. He watched her cry the way someone watches rain fall. Present but entirely unmoved.

An immense anger raged through him beneath the calm surface. He didn't care about the personal affairs of his employees. People could be foolish in their private lives and it was none of his concern. But when they brought that foolishness into his space, when they got unrealistic ideas about him and acted on them, that was a line. And Kim had crossed it boldly.

The door opened. Matthias walked in with two other men.

Kim looked at them and the crying stopped. Something colder than fear replaced it.

"Ensure she doesn't step foot in this city," Jaxon said without looking up. "And that I never see her again."

The two men moved toward Kim. She stepped back and her heel caught on the edge of the rug. "Wait. Wait, please, you can't do this, I'll go to the press, I'll tell them you—"

One of the men did a swift knife chop to the side of her neck. Kim crumpled immediately. They caught her before she hit the floor and carried her out efficiently, using the exclusive elevator so other employees wouldn't see. The office was quiet again within seconds.

Jaxon dismissed Matthias with a single gesture.

He placed the cigarette on the ashtray and stared at the ceiling for a moment. He had known an enemy placed Kim on his side but he hadn't acted on it immediately. He had waited and watched, wanting to understand the full scope of the plan before he dismantled it. Unfortunately the spy they brought fell for him before she could be of any real use to whoever sent her.

"Well," he murmured, a smirk appearing on his face. "It's not my fault for being handsome."

He chuckled quietly at how it had played out. Whoever sent her had underestimated him. That was their first mistake. They always underestimated him. And they always paid for it eventually.

Jaxon stood from his chair and moved toward the mini workstation in the corner of his office where design drafts were spread across the surface. He picked up a pencil and began sketching an evening dress, the lines coming easily and without hesitation. He always preferred doing a draft on paper first before transferring it to a digital format. There was something about paper that focused him. Something honest about the way a pencil moved that a screen could never fully replicate.

Three hours passed.

The city outside the window had shifted from the grey of evening into the full dark of night by the time he set the pencil down and stretched his fingers. He checked the time. Late. Later than he usually stayed.

He picked up the marriage certificate from the desk and looked at it one final time. At the name printed beside his own. At the small unsteady signature.

Savannah Miller. His wife.

A sinister smile graced his face.

"Now Savannah," he murmured, setting the certificate down and reaching for his jacket. "Time for us to meet."