Robert Kane didn't believe in office power plays.
He believed in results — measurable, tangible outcomes that justified one's salary and title. Everything else — the gossip, the alliances, the performative camaraderie — was background noise.
At Hale & Partners, the noise was particularly loud.
He'd been there just under three weeks and already recognised the usual ecosystem of predators and peacocks: the ones who networked rather than worked, the ones who smiled too brightly, and the ones who'd sell their grandmother for a step up in the company.
And then there was Isabelle Cole.
He'd watched her move through the chaos like someone who hadn't realised she was standing in a minefield — calm, precise, genuinely efficient. Which, in his experience, made her either very clever or dangerously naïve.
He suspected the latter.
She didn't play the politics. Didn't flatter, didn't gossip. She simply did her job — and did it well.
That kind of purity didn't last long in places like this. There were vultures in every corridor, circling quietly above anyone who dared to be competent without being cunning.
He sipped his coffee and glanced through the glass walls of the meeting room he'd started using as an office. The open-plan floor buzzed with Friday energy — emails flying, voices raised in polite urgency. Isabelle sat at her desk, neat as a pinned specimen, focused on something on her screen.
Sienna perched on the edge of a colleague's desk a few metres away, all perfume and false laughter. She'd been circling him all week — leaning over too close in meetings, finding excuses to "drop by" to ask questions that had very little to do with PR.
He didn't encourage it.
"Morning, Robert," she said now, appearing at his door as if summoned by thought.
He looked up from his laptop. "Morning."
She leaned against the doorframe, smile bright and deliberate. "Big weekend ahead?"
"Work."
"Always so serious." Her tone held a teasing lilt, though her eyes searched his face too intently. "You're not from London, are you?"
"Manchester," he said shortly.
"Ah, northern charm. I knew there was something different about you." She tilted her head. "Richard speaks very highly of you, you know."
"I'd expect nothing less."
She laughed, missing the dry edge in his voice. "You're very confident."
"I'm very busy."
That did it — the faintest twitch in her smile, the kind that appears when someone's pride has been nicked. She straightened, smoothing a hand down her immaculate skirt.
"Well, if you ever need a hand —"
"I'll let you know."
She lingered one second too long, then left, her perfume hanging in the doorway.
Robert exhaled quietly. He'd met dozens of Siennas in his career — ambitious, charming, eager to climb whatever ladder was within reach. There was nothing wrong with ambition; he respected it. But the shameless flirtation, the subtle manipulations — they bored him now.
Once upon a time, he might have played along.
But not anymore.
He'd spent too many years dealing with opportunists — women and men both — who smiled wide and took what they could. His last relationship had ended in a spectacular mix of betrayal and legal paperwork. Since then, he'd built walls. High ones.
He didn't care anymore. Not about colleagues. Not about corporate theatre. Not about anyone.
That afternoon, Richard had insisted on dragging him into another strategy meeting — an hour of jargon and posturing that Robert endured in silence. He sat at the far end of the large meeting table, half-listening as Richard waxed lyrical about client trust and long-term positioning.
Across from him, Isabelle took notes in her tidy, slanted handwriting. She didn't interrupt, didn't embellish — just captured everything accurately.
When the meeting ended, she began collecting the handouts.
"Leave them," he said, perhaps more brusquely than intended. "I'll sort it."
She paused, surprised. "It's my job."
"I said I'll do it."
Her lips pressed together — not quite defiance, but close — and she set the papers down. "As you wish."
As she left the room, he caught a trace of her scent — light, nothing ostentatious. Clean. Practical.
He sat back, frowning at his reflection in the glass. He couldn't work her out.
There was no angle to her. No hidden ambition. She didn't even seem to realise how attractive she was — which, perversely, made it more noticeable.
It wasn't that he liked her. He didn't. She was… interesting, in the way a puzzle is interesting before you've solved it. He'd seen people like her burn out before — the conscientious ones, the ones who believed hard work was its own reward.
It never was.
Corporate life devoured people like Isabelle. Sooner or later, someone sharper, louder, or more ruthless would make sure of it.
Still, he caught himself watching her more than was reasonable — noting the slight crease between her brows when she read something, the quiet efficiency of her movements, the way she spoke to people without condescension.
He told himself it was professional curiosity.
That was easier than admitting anything else.
When Eleanor Hale arrived for lunch that day, he'd nearly groaned aloud.
He hadn't seen Richard's wife in years, but she hadn't changed — elegant, poised, and every bit as cutting as ever. The kind of woman who saw people not as individuals but as accessories to her social landscape.
"Robert Kane!" she'd exclaimed as she swept into the office. "Still in one piece, I see."
He'd forced a smile. "You as well, Eleanor."
"You must come to dinner sometime. We'll have a proper catch-up. Richard and I were just saying the other day how long it's been."
"Were you?" he said mildly.
"Oh, constantly." Her eyes glinted. "It's not often Richard speaks so highly of another man. Usually it's all about his staff."
And there it was — the barb. She turned her attention to Isabelle then, gaze sharp and assessing.
Isabelle had managed a professional smile, though Robert could see the discomfort behind it.
Eleanor's next comment was a dagger disguised as banter: "I said to him, it's practically charity, isn't it? Taking on single mothers and all that. Still, one must do one's bit."
The silence that followed was thick and awkward.
Robert had caught Isabelle's tiny flinch — the only sign she'd taken the hit. He'd said nothing; it wasn't his place. But he'd felt an unexpected flicker of anger, sharp and unwelcome.
Eleanor had always been cruel in silk gloves. She hadn't changed.
When she finally left with Richard, Robert found himself standing by the window, jaw tight.
It shouldn't have bothered him. He wasn't responsible for other people's feelings — least of all a colleague's.
Yet, something about the scene stayed with him all afternoon: the quiet humiliation in Isabelle's face, the way she'd straightened her shoulders as though to refuse pity.
He admired that, though he'd never admit it.
Later, as the office emptied out, he passed Isabelle's desk on his way to the lift. She was still there, as always, absorbed in her work.
"You planning to sleep here?" he said dryly.
She didn't look up. "Not tonight."
"You're aware it's gone seven?"
"I'm aware."
He hesitated. "You don't have to prove anything, you know."
Her eyes flicked up to his. "I'm not trying to."
He nodded once, then moved on. But her voice followed him, quiet and firm.
"Some of us don't have the luxury of not caring."
He stopped. Looked back. She was bent over her keyboard again, typing steadily, as if the conversation hadn't happened.
For a moment, he felt the ground shift under him, something he'd long kept solid — a faint, inconvenient pull he refused to name.
He left without replying.
That night, in his flat overlooking the Thames, he poured himself a whisky and stared out at the city lights. The reflection in the glass looked older than he remembered — sharper around the edges.
He thought of Sienna's perfume, Eleanor's smile, Isabelle's steady voice.
He told himself it was just another job. Another company full of fragile egos and hidden knives.
But as he took another sip, he knew he was lying to himself — at least about one of them.
He didn't know what to make of Isabelle Cole.
He only knew she'd started to occupy space in his mind that no one had in a very long time.
And that, he told himself grimly, was a complication he didn't need.