Tracy's POV
When Nathan told me about the dinner, I thought it would just be a small thing. A quiet gathering to celebrate the new hires, maybe a few speeches, a toast, and everyone would go home. I was not expecting laughter echoing across the restaurant, glasses clinking, plates filled with more food than I could name.
It was warm in a way the office never was. Without the rigid walls and formal clothes, people loosened. The women wore colorful dresses, the men set aside their stiff jackets, and for the first time since I joined, I felt like I was meeting the people behind the job titles.
I laughed more that evening than I had in months. I let myself relax. The weight I carried— the heartbreak, the doubts, the way Ethan's cold presence haunted me—faded for a little while.
Nathan sat to my left, and as always, he was… attentive. He didn't make it obvious, but I noticed the little things. How he pulled out my chair when I arrived. How he made sure my glass was always refilled. How his eyes lingered just a little longer than they should when I spoke.
It made me feel seen. After everything I'd been through, that small feeling was more precious than I cared to admit.
At one point, when the conversation turned to funny mistakes at work, I told a story about the time I'd sent an email to the wrong client years ago, and everyone burst out laughing. Nathan's laugh was the loudest, and his hand brushed mine on the table when he leaned closer, still chuckling.
For a moment, I almost forgot everything else.
And then he walked in.
Ethan.
The room shifted instantly, like a candle flame flickering when a window is thrown open. People sat straighter, voices quieted just a little, laughter died down to a more polite hum. It was not fear, exactly— it was respect, but the kind laced with unease.
My heart stuttered in my chest.
He hadn't been expected. Everyone thought the CEO was too busy, too important, to bother with a dinner like this. But there he was, tall and commanding, his presence swallowing the room whole.
His eyes scanned the crowd briefly, expression unreadable. And then, just for a second, they landed on me.
I froze, my smile fading, my fork halfway to my mouth.
He looked away just as quickly, but not before his gaze flickered sideways— to Nathan.
I don't know if anyone else noticed, but I did. That quiet exchange where no words were spoken but everything was understood. Ethan saw the way Nathan's attention lingered on me, and though he pretended not to, I knew he had noticed.
He joined the table, and the air never quite returned to the warmth it had before. Conversations grew more careful, laughter less free. I tried to slip back into the mood, but my chest was tight, my thoughts running circles.
Why did it matter so much to me what he thought? Why did I care if he noticed Nathan's admiration?
I told myself it was nothing, that Ethan's opinion of me should not matter. But when his eyes brushed over me again later— briefly, coolly— I felt something I could not explain.
I left the dinner smiling at colleagues and thanking them for the evening, but inside, I carried a storm.
Nathan admired me openly. Ethan pretended he didn't care.
And me? I did not even know what was happening anymore.
Ethan's Pov
I had not planned to be there.
Dinners like that were usually beneath my schedule— celebrations for new hires, handshakes and laughter, small talk that always felt rehearsed. But something in me wanted to see it, to see them outside the office walls. Maybe to remind myself that the people who worked for me were human, not just names on reports.
At least, that was the excuse I told myself.
The truth was, the moment I walked in and my eyes fell on her, I knew why I was there.
Tracy.
She was laughing at something one of her colleagues said, her shoulders relaxed, her smile unguarded. She looked different without the office weight pressing on her. Softer. Livelier. And damn me if I did not notice how Nathan leaned toward her, how his attention never strayed too far from her side.
Nathan.
A good man, reliable, loyal. Someone I trusted. But the way he looked at her… I recognized it instantly. Admiration. Interest. The kind that didn't belong in the workplace but crept in anyway.
I forced myself to look away, to keep my expression unreadable. I was good at that— pretending I didn't notice things I saw too clearly. Pretending I did not care.
But I did notice. I noticed the way she carried herself, not trying to command the room yet somehow drawing people in. I noticed the way Nathan laughed louder at her jokes, the way his hand brushed hers on the table, subtle but deliberate.
And I noticed the strange twist in my chest when she smiled back at him.
It should not have mattered. She was just another employee. An assistant, no less. Nathan had every right to admire her, to pursue her, to make her laugh if that is what he wanted. It had nothing to do with me.
That was what I told myself as I sat at the far end of the table, nodding at polite greetings, half- listening to conversations. But the lie tasted bitter.
Every so often, my gaze drifted back to her. She did not see me watching— not really. Or maybe she did, and she pretended not to, just as I did.
I thought of our first encounter in the lobby, when she had no idea who I was. She had looked at me then as if I were just a man, not a CEO. There had been something disarming in that moment, something I could not shake even now.
I clenched my jaw, forcing myself to refocus when someone asked me a question. My answers were clipped, professional, distant— the way they always were. No one could guess that inside, my thoughts were tangled in ways they had not been for years.
When the dinner ended, I left without a word more than necessary. My control was slipping, and I couldn't afford that. Not here. Not ever.
But as I sat in the back of the car, watching the city lights blur past the window, her face came back to me— the sound of her laugh, the light in her eyes when she spoke.
I had been long I felt this way.
And the bitter truth hit me harder than I wanted to admit.
-
I had noticed. I could not pretend I hadn't.
And worse, I cared.