Adrian
The conference room felt too small for the number of bodies in it, or maybe it was just my mood compressing the space, making every breath feel like I was inhaling someone else’s exhale.
Papers were spread across the long table—financial forecasts, risk projections, territorial expansion plans—yet none of it anchored me the way it usually did. My mind wandered in places it shouldn’t, to thoughts I couldn’t name aloud, to the emotional distance at home that gnawed at me in ways I had never experienced.
Camila stood beside me, leaning over to point something out on the displayed charts.
She was close enough that I could smell the faint citrus in her perfume, something clean and bright, a scent that didn’t belong in the cold tension of this meeting. I tried to shift away casually, but she only mirrored the movement to stay near the documents, unaware—or perhaps too aware—of how tightly wound I was.
When the men across the table began arguing over shipping route allocations, she leaned in, her voice low, warm, almost sympathetic.
“You’re handling this beautifully,” she murmured, eyes lifting to mine with a quiet conviction. “Even when they push, you never lose your composure.”
I forced a small laugh, though nothing about her comment felt humorous. “It’s part of the job. Someone has to stay sane in the room.”
“But not everyone can,” she said gently, her hand brushing my forearm as if the contact were accidental, though it lingered half a moment longer than an accident should. “It’s a rare strength, Adrian. You lead without raising your voice. People follow you because they trust you, not because they fear you.”
Her words shouldn’t have mattered.
They shouldn’t have touched anything inside me. But they did. They slid into a hollow space I had been trying to ignore for too long—the place where Serafina’s recognition used to live. It wasn’t her fault; she had the world on her shoulders now.
She had become a Donna worth fearing and respecting, and I was proud, so damn proud. But there were nights when I reached for her and she was too exhausted to reach back.
Days when I spoke and she nodded absently, mind elsewhere. Weeks when I poured into us and felt her slipping, slipping, slipping further away.
And here was Camila, standing close enough to feel like presence instead of absence.
“Thank you,” I said quietly, and I meant it in a way that made guilt flicker beneath my ribs. “I don’t always feel like I’m getting it right lately.”
“Then they’re blind,” she whispered, leaning a fraction closer. “Because I see it every day.”
Her hand brushed mine again, lighter this time but undeniably intentional. I felt the warmth of it—gentle, reassuring, undeserved—and something in me tightened painfully before loosening in a way that scared me.
The argument across the room rose in volume, giving us a strange pocket of intimacy beneath the chaos. Camila tilted her head, studying my face with more perception than I wanted her to have.
“You look tired,” she said softly. “And not just the usual kind.”
It felt like a question disguised as an observation, an invitation I should never accept. Still, I answered because the loneliness inside me was a living creature, desperate for any acknowledgment. “There’s a lot happening at home. A lot I’m trying to make sense of.”
Her eyes softened, warm with concern. “You carry so much, Adrian. More than anyone realizes.”
“I’m not complaining.”
“I know,” she murmured, and then in a tone that felt like the slow unraveling of restraint, “That’s why it’s so unfair.”
The conversation was dangerously close to something I shouldn’t be having, but I didn’t stop it. I didn’t know how to stop it without exposing the truth I couldn’t bear to say aloud: that I felt invisible in the one place I had always been seen.
By the time the meeting ended hours later, the storm inside me had only grown worse. I stayed behind to gather my papers, more for the solitude than the need for organization.
Camila remained as well, gathering her laptop with deliberate slowness. When I finally lifted my head, she was watching me with an expression too gentle to be professional.
“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked quietly. “Not as your assistant… as someone who cares.”
“I shouldn’t,” I said, though the words came out strained.
“You don’t have to tell me anything,” she whispered, stepping close enough that her breath brushed my jaw. “Just let me be here with you.”
Her hand touched my arm again, fingers curling just enough to anchor me. The warmth rushed through me in a wave that felt both comforting and treacherous. I should have stepped back. I should have told her this was inappropriate, unprofessional, dangerous.
But instead, I stayed still—immobile, suspended—because the ache inside me was too heavy and her gentleness too easy to lean into.
I closed my eyes.
That was my first mistake.
When I opened them again, she was closer, her hand sliding up my arm, her voice barely audible. “You deserve to feel supported, Adrian. You deserve someone who listens.”
“I have someone,” I said, but even I heard how hollow it sounded.
“Someone who listens,” she repeated, as if correcting the definition.
My breath caught, because she wasn’t wrong—not entirely, not in the ways that mattered in moments like this. Serafina listened to the needs of a family, a council, an empire. But me? My wants, my exhaustion, my doubts—they got lost somewhere between crisis meetings and whispered lullabies.
Camila stepped in fully, her body brushing mine in a way that shattered my remaining restraint. “You don’t have to be alone tonight,” she said. “Let me take care of you. Just this once. Let me carry something for you.”
Her touch slid to my chest, and I broke.
I didn’t think. I didn’t question. I didn’t even breathe properly. I let her lead me into the dim private office adjoining the conference room, the door closing behind us with a soft click that sounded like a betrayal made solid.
Everything that happened after was a blur of heat, desperation, and quiet words meant to soothe a man who should never have sought solace in another woman’s arms. I let her comfort me, touch me, unravel me, and I responded with the hunger of someone who had been starving far longer than he’d realized.
When it was over, when I finally pulled myself away and sank onto the edge of the sofa with my head in my hands, the guilt hit with brutal force. It crawled up my throat, sharp and acidic, whispering every damnation my father would have spat at me.
But buried beneath the self-loathing was something darker—a strange, treacherous relief.
As though some tightly coiled wire inside me had finally snapped.
As though something inside me had needed to break.
And I hated myself for how true that felt.