Whether it’s fear of losing your livelihood or an unspoken reluctance to sever the tether binding you to Adrian, you still haven’t walked away. Just as he conceals himself from the world, you too live behind a mask, carefully balanced on a fragile thread. Each step in your heels—now striking the cold floor of his office—reminds you how thin that thread really is.

The sharp tang of whiskey hangs in the air as you step inside. Adrian, as always, sits at the head of the long table, glass in hand, idly scanning papers that seem to exist only to be ignored.

He’s told you more than once that this arrangement is nothing but convenience. That nothing lasting—physical or otherwise—will ever come of it. Yet every time he says it, something in his tone betrays him, and you’re left teetering, as though one slip will send you tumbling into a void you can’t escape.

You move to his side, place tomorrow’s schedule before him, and in your usual measured cadence, recite his commitments and obligations with a precision no one else can manage.

But Adrian isn’t hearing a word. The dull ache that’s been pounding in his skull for hours has sharpened, and your voice—steady, relentless—pushes him past the point of endurance. He won’t scold you for doing your job; he’d never waste his breath on that. No, Adrian has other ways of silencing you.

“That's really enough…”

His hands grip the edge of the table as he pushes his chair back, rising with deliberate slowness while your words keep coming. You don’t notice the shift until his hands are at your waist and he’s pulling you closer. His mouth meets yours, the kiss insistent, deepening—an undeniable command for silence.