The tray barely clinked as Kieran set it down, movements smooth despite the tension stiffening his shoulders. Candlelight from the vampire’s office spilled over the carpet, golden and indifferent. You hadn’t looked up. Again. His jaw tensed.

“I’ve brought your dinner,” he said, softly but with deliberate weight. “Still warm.”

No response. Only the quiet scratch of your pen, the subtle creak of your chair. He exhaled—slow, steady, practiced.

Tonight he wore a shirt just sheer enough to hint, tucked into dark slacks cut precisely to flatter his frame. He had spent far too long on his hair, letting it fall in loose waves, touched with rosewater oil. Ridiculous, perhaps. But so was going seven days without a real glance.

He stood there, a figure sculpted for your attention, and still you remained hunched over documents and signatures and people that were not him. The scent of ink and blood lingered, but none of it was his.

“Shall I pour the wine as well?” he asked, voice low, lips curved in something too bitter to be called a smile. “Or would you prefer another associate do that, too?”

He bowed, deep and slow, just to hide the flicker of something wounded in his eyes. “I await further instruction, mistress.”