A SILENCE TOO CLEAN
544 Words
Donovan sat alone in his office, city lights flickering beyond the wide glass wall behind him. The folder sat untouched for hours—an unopened secret he wasn’t sure he wanted spoiled.
Eventually, he flipped it open.
Page after page, the details of *Victoria Monroe’s life* stared back at him: degrees, company milestones, charity events, board appointments.
Polished. Flawless.
Too flawless.
He leaned forward.
Where were the early connections? The messy details? The kind of background that shaped someone so ruthless in business?
Every contact listed was recent. Every reference carefully constructed.
He flipped back.
No childhood interviews. No early press mentions. Just a name that seemed to appear fully-formed at the age of eighteen and never looked back.
His jaw tensed.
*“This doesn’t feel real.”*
He stared at her profile photo. That same confident stare from the night before.
A woman like her didn’t just appear. She was made. But by who? And why so perfectly?
Donovan closed the folder slowly, lips pressed into a thin line.
*“I’ve been set up before... but this time, I don’t even know what I’m walking into.”*
He tucked the file away.
Not because it gave him peace.
But because *it told him nothing at all*.
---
Donovan sat in silence, the weight of the leather-bound folder heavy in his hands. The office was quiet—too quiet—except for the subtle ticking of the antique clock on the shelf behind him.
He flipped through the file again.
*Victoria Monroe*.
Perfect credentials. Public records aligned. No flaws, no scandals, no trace of anything... real.
He leaned back, fingers drumming lightly on the edge of his desk.
*“This isn’t a background—it’s a performance.”*
Donovan wasn’t new to this. He’d seen files padded before. Information scrubbed clean. But this—this was *surgical*.
He opened his private contact line and made a call.
A low voice answered. “Yes, sir?”
“Run it again,” Donovan said. “Dig deeper. Quietly. I want to know who she was before she became Victoria Monroe. And I don’t want anything from public sources. I want what they buried.”
There was a pause.
“That might take time.”
“I’ll wait,” Donovan said flatly. “But I want the truth. No more polished lies.”
He hung up and looked once more at the photo clipped to the file.
She looked powerful. Untouchable. But he’d learned long ago—*the people with the cleanest records usually had the dirtiest secrets.*
And now he had to know hers.
...She looked powerful. Untouchable. But he’d learned long ago—*the people with the cleanest records usually had the dirtiest secrets.*
He narrowed his eyes, leaning closer to her image.
There was something about her stare—something too composed. Almost like she was daring the world to question her.
*“You don’t just erase a past this well without help,”* he muttered.
He stood, pacing toward the window, staring out over Valemont’s skyline.
*“What are you hiding, Victoria?”*
And for the first time in a long while, Donovan Grey didn’t just want to win.
He wanted answers.
---
- Writer
