Chapter One: The Interview

The elevator ride to the thirty-seventh floor felt like a countdown to something Harper Lane wasn’t ready for. She smoothed her skirt for the tenth time, heart pounding under her blouse like a warning bell.

“Just breathe,” she whispered to herself as the polished metal doors slid open with a soft ding.

The offices of Wolfe International were nothing like the places she’d worked before. Everything gleamed—glass walls, chrome finishes, cold elegance. It screamed money. Power. Control. And somewhere at the top of it all was Easton Wolfe.

Her new boss—if she didn’t screw this up.

“Ms. Lane?” a voice called, snapping her out of her thoughts. A woman with clipped heels and a tighter bun than seemed medically safe walked toward her. “Mr. Wolfe will see you now.”

Already?

Harper followed the woman down a hallway so quiet she could hear her own heartbeat. She tried not to let her nerves show, but the truth was, she hadn’t had a real interview in months. Not since her ex-boyfriend-slash-ex-boss left her with a broken heart and a reputation she couldn’t shake.

The assistant opened the glass door, and Harper stepped into the lion’s den.

Easton Wolfe didn’t look up right away. He was behind his desk, sleeves rolled to his elbows, tie loosened just enough to be tempting. His hair was dark, his jaw sharper than it had any right to be. He didn’t need to stand to own the room—he was the room.

When he finally looked at her, Harper felt the air shift. His gaze was cool, unreadable. The kind that made you want to tell him your secrets just to see if he’d flinch.

“You’re late,” he said.

She blinked. “It’s 9:00 a.m. on the dot.”

“I said arrive before nine,” he replied smoothly, rising from his chair. “Punctual is average. I don’t hire average.”

Oh, hell no.

“I guess I’ll have to be exceptional then,” Harper shot back, chin lifting. She wasn’t going to let him rattle her, no matter how annoyingly good-looking he was.

Easton’s mouth curved into something almost like a smirk. “We’ll see.”

He circled his desk like a predator, stopping in front of her. He was tall. Intimidating. But Harper held his gaze, even when everything inside her screamed to look away.

“I don’t tolerate mistakes. I don’t repeat myself. I don’t care about your excuses, your personal life, or whether you’re having a bad day,” he said, voice low. “You work for me, you work on my terms.”

Harper didn’t flinch. “And I work by my rules. I don’t fetch coffee unless I drink it too. I don’t lie, I don’t flirt, and I don’t let men like you walk all over me.”

For a second, silence stretched between them. Then—he laughed. Not a big laugh, just a dry chuckle like she’d surprised him.

“Interesting,” Easton said. “Sit down, Ms. Lane.”

She did.

The rest of the interview was a blur of sharp questions and even sharper looks. But by the end, he said three words she didn’t expect.

“You’re hired. Temporarily.”

“Temporarily?” she asked.

“You’ll last a week, maybe two,” he said, walking back to his desk. “Then we’ll see if you’re still interesting.”

Challenge accepted, Harper thought.

But what she didn’t know—what neither of them knew—was that this was the beginning of something dangerous. Something electric. Something that would burn every rule they thought they lived by.

Chapter Two: The First Day

Harper stood in front of the mirror in her tiny bathroom, mascara wand in one hand and self-doubt in the other.

You’ve got this, she told herself for the fifth time.

Yesterday’s interview with Easton Wolfe was still playing on a loop in her head. The way he looked at her like he was sizing her up. The way he spoke like he expected her to crumble.

But she hadn’t.

She gave as good as she got, and somehow… he hired her.

Sort of.

Temporarily, he’d said. Like she was on borrowed time.

Well, that was fine by her. Harper had survived worse than cold glares and power plays. She didn’t come to New York to play it safe. She came to win.

After tossing her makeup in her bag and smoothing the wrinkle in her blouse for the third time, she grabbed her coat and headed out. She’d planned for extra time this morning. No way was she walking in “on the dot” again.

⸻

By 8:35 a.m., Harper was standing in front of Wolfe International’s sleek glass doors, heart racing but feet steady.

She stepped into the elevator with three other people in expensive suits and the same tight, unreadable expressions. She held her chin high, even if her stomach felt like it was doing backflips.

The elevator stopped at the thirty-seventh floor. She took a deep breath and walked out, heels clicking softly against the floor.

Same office. Same shine. Same quiet.

But today, it felt different. Today, it felt like her battlefield.

“Ms. Lane,” said the tight-bun assistant—Madeline, she remembered. “Mr. Wolfe is in his office. He left instructions for you.”

Of course he did.

Harper followed Madeline to her new desk, which was positioned just outside Easton Wolfe’s office. There was a sleek laptop, a stack of files, and a short typed note waiting for her.

8:00 a.m. meeting with Boston. Reschedule to 9:00.

Lunch with Foster moved to Friday. Make it a working lunch.

Fix the Snyder contract. It’s a mess. Find the errors.

Don’t mess this up.

—E. Wolfe

Harper raised a brow. Don’t mess this up? Really? Not even a “good morning”?

Whatever. She’d dealt with worse than a boss who thought he was king of the world.

She rolled up her sleeves—figuratively and literally—and got to work.

⸻

Two hours in, Harper had rescheduled meetings, rewritten parts of the Snyder contract, and figured out that Wolfe’s calendar system was a maze designed by a madman.

At 10:16 a.m., the phone on her desk rang.

“Harper,” she said, picking it up.

“Coffee,” Easton’s voice said. Just that one word. And then he hung up.

Harper stared at the phone.

Was that a request? A demand? Did he even say please to anyone?

She stood, grabbed her notebook, and marched into his office.

Easton looked up from his desk, annoyed.

“Problem?”

“If you want coffee, you’re going to have to be more specific,” Harper said, standing just inside the door. “Black? Cream? Sugar? Or are we playing some sort of guessing game?”

His eyes narrowed, like he couldn’t decide if she was being bold or stupid.

“Black. Two sugars,” he said finally.

She smiled. “See? That wasn’t so hard.”

He didn’t smile back. Of course not.

She turned to go but heard him say, “You’re not like the others.”

She stopped, looked over her shoulder. “Others?”

“My assistants. They usually don’t talk back.”

Harper shrugged. “Maybe you’ve been hiring the wrong people.”

He leaned back in his chair, watching her like she was a puzzle he hadn’t solved yet.

“Or maybe I’ve finally hired the right one,” he said.

Her heart skipped.

But she walked out without a word.

⸻

By noon, she’d had enough of staring at spreadsheets and trying to translate Easton Wolfe’s half-written notes. She stood to stretch and saw him through the glass wall of his office, pacing while on the phone.

He looked different when he wasn’t scowling. More… human. Still too handsome for her sanity, but human.

She turned back to her desk, only to hear his door swing open.

“Come in here,” he said.

She blinked. “Sorry?”

“You have five minutes,” he added. “Don’t waste them.”

What in the world…

She walked in, trying not to let her confusion show.

Easton hung up the phone and gestured toward the chair across from his desk. She sat, feeling like she was walking into a pop quiz.

“I want to know why you’re here,” he said.

She frowned. “You hired me.”

“I mean in New York. In this office. In this life. You’re not just another assistant. You don’t act like one. Why?”

Harper hesitated.

She could lie. Say she wanted experience, or that she liked fast-paced jobs.

But instead, she said, “Because I’m starting over. I needed something new. Something hard. I didn’t come here to be safe.”

He nodded slowly, like that answer pleased him.

“You’ll need thick skin,” he said. “I’m not easy to work for.”

“I don’t need easy,” she replied. “I need honest.”

That got a reaction. Just a flicker in his eyes, like she’d hit a nerve.

He stood, turning his back to her. “You’ll be tested here, Harper. Not just by me. By this whole world.”

“I’m not afraid of hard work,” she said, rising too.

He glanced at her over his shoulder.

“I’m not talking about work,” he said quietly.

Then he turned back to his desk like the conversation was over.

And maybe it was.

But Harper walked out of his office feeling like the rules had just changed.

And she wasn’t sure who had changed them—him… or her.

Chapter Three: Warning Signs

By the end of Harper’s second day, she was exhausted.

Not just the usual kind of tired—this was a full-body, deep-in-the-bones kind of fatigue that came from being constantly on edge. Every move she made felt like it was under a microscope. Every email she sent, every calendar change, every word out of her mouth.

She had to be sharp. Fast. Perfect.

Because Easton Wolfe didn’t give second chances.

And yet… something about it all lit a fire in her. She hadn’t felt this alive in a long time.

After her last job—after the mess with Alex, the betrayal, the whispers behind her back—Harper had almost forgotten what it felt like to believe in herself.

But now?

Now she was standing her ground. Pushing back. Holding her own with a man who made other people shrink with just a glance.

And the craziest part?

He seemed to like it.

⸻

“Leave it,” Easton said without looking up as she walked into his office with a thick file.

She stopped halfway to his desk. “Leave it where?”

He finally looked at her, like he hadn’t realized who he was speaking to. “On the corner.”

She placed the folder down gently, then didn’t move.

He glanced up again. “Something else?”

“You asked me to look through this report. There are three errors in the totals, and one of the signatures is missing. It’s not ready.”

He leaned back in his chair. “Then fix it.”

“I already did.”

He blinked.

“And I called the legal team. They’re correcting the original file,” she added, crossing her arms. “I thought you should know.”

Easton’s lips curved, just a little. “You don’t wait for instructions.”

“You don’t give them clearly,” she shot back.

That made him laugh—a quiet, low sound that made her pulse skip. She hated that he had that kind of effect on her. Hated even more that she couldn’t hide it.

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” he said, “but you’re a pain in the ass.”

Harper smiled sweetly. “And yet here I am.”

“You’ll either be the best thing that’s happened to this office, or you’ll crash and burn.”

“Guess we’ll find out,” she said, then turned and walked out.

⸻

At 5:47 p.m., she was still at her desk.

The office was nearly empty. Most of the staff had cleared out by five, but she was still cross-checking a vendor list Easton had thrown on her desk twenty minutes before the end of the day.

He didn’t say it had to be done tonight.

But he also hadn’t said it could wait.

And she was starting to learn that silence in this office meant “figure it out yourself.”

“Still here?”

Harper looked up to see Madeline standing by the edge of her desk, coat in hand.

“Just finishing something,” Harper said with a small smile.

Madeline gave her a look. “Wolfe’s assistants don’t usually last more than a few weeks. Just a heads-up.”

“I figured,” Harper said.

Madeline hesitated. “It’s not just the work. He’s… intense.”

Harper nodded, unsure what to say.

“He doesn’t do small talk. He doesn’t do friendly. And he definitely doesn’t do second chances,” Madeline said quietly. “So whatever’s happening in there—be careful.”

Harper tilted her head. “Are you warning me… or telling me to back off?”

Madeline’s expression didn’t change. “Just giving you the lay of the land.”

With that, she walked away.

Harper stared after her for a long second before turning back to her screen.

It wasn’t like she needed anyone to tell her that Easton Wolfe was dangerous. She already knew that.

What she didn’t know was why she couldn’t stop thinking about him.

⸻

At 6:12 p.m., she finally shut down her computer and stood to leave.

She was halfway to the elevator when his door opened.

“Harper.”

She froze, then turned slowly. “Yes?”

Easton stood in his doorway, sleeves rolled up again, tie loosened like it was a habit. He looked like power and sin in one perfect package.

“I’m going out for dinner,” he said. “Come with me.”

Harper blinked. “Excuse me?”

“Dinner. You’ve earned it. And I need to go over a few things.”

“I didn’t realize this was part of the job description.”

“It’s not. It’s me being… generous.”

She hesitated. Every part of her told her this was a bad idea. Office rule number one: never mix business with pleasure. And this man? He was nothing but danger wrapped in a suit.

But another part of her—one she didn’t want to name—was curious.

About him.

About what this dinner would mean.

About what it wouldn’t.

She lifted her chin. “Fine. But I pick the place.”

Easton’s brows rose. “You don’t even know where we’re going.”

“Doesn’t matter. You’re used to people saying yes to everything. I’m not one of them.”

He studied her for a moment, then gave a slow nod. “Interesting.”

She turned back toward the elevator, heart pounding.

She didn’t know what the hell she was doing.

But she knew one thing for sure—this wasn’t just work anymore.

Not for her.

And maybe not for him either.