Elara couldn't breathe.
She couldn't think.
Every nerve in her body buzzed with Damien's words, his nearness, the way he'd looked at her like she was the only person in the galaxy.
And that was exactly why she had to get out.
She stormed into her office, slammed the door, and pressed her palms flat against her desk. "Nope. Nope, nope, nope. This is not happening. I refuse."
Her reflection in the darkened computer screen stared back at her: flushed cheeks, wide eyes, hair in rebellious curls. She looked like a woman on the brink — not of success, not of stability, but of complete, disastrous surrender.
She yanked her phone out of her bag and dialed.
"Savannah?"
Her best friend's voice crackled through the line. "Ooooh, you sound like you just either committed a crime or had sex with your boss. Which one?"
"Neither," Elara hissed. "Yet. And that's the problem."
Savannah cackled. "I knew it. You're falling for him."
"I'm not falling," Elara snapped, throwing her heels into her tote bag. "I'm plummeting. Headfirst. No parachute. Straight into the concrete."
"Okay, and the problem is…?"
"The problem is he's Damien Kane. My boss. The man whose reputation could make or break me. The man who literally said, 'I don't mix business with pleasure,' and then had the audacity to look at me like I'm his exception."
"Babe, you are the exception."
"Well, I don't want to be," she said, her voice cracking. "Because the more I stay, the more I… I…" She bit her lip hard, refusing to say it. Refusing to admit how badly she wanted him.
So she did the only thing she could do: she pulled out her laptop, typed up a resignation letter, and hit print.
Her hands trembled as she folded it neatly, slid it into an envelope, and scribbled his name across the front in her messy, looping handwriting.
She stood there staring at it like it was a death warrant.
Maybe it was.
Because leaving Damien Kane meant saving herself… but it also meant losing the only man who'd ever seen her, really seen her, behind all her walls.
Her heart pounded. Her stomach twisted. She grabbed her coat, slung her bag over her shoulder, and whispered to the empty office, "Goodbye, Damien."
Then she walked out.
Straight past the elevators.
Straight past the curious glances of coworkers.
Straight toward freedom.
But what she didn't know—what she couldn't know—was that Damien Kane had already read her resignation.
And he wasn't about to let her go.