Longing For Him

CHAPTER 9: Perhaps A Coffee? Perhaps Not

Jennie

The door closes behind me.

I don't remember my feet moving. One second I'm standing in front of his desk, watching four years of silence harden into something unrecognizable behind his eyes, and the next I'm in the hallway, the door sealed between us like a verdict.

For a moment I stay there, my hand still wrapped around the handle, as though it might open again if I wait long enough.

My throat tightens. I swallow, but it does nothing to ease the ache lodged there. I had prepared myself for anger. I had prepared myself for coldness, even for hatred. What I hadn't prepared for was the complete absence of recognition in his eyes — as though the four years between us had erased everything, as though I were a stranger to him.

He hates me.

Four years of rehearsing this moment — four years of dreaming he might look at me with even a fraction of the warmth he used to hold — shattered in under ten minutes. The boy who used to trace my jawline and whisper secrets into my neck was gone. In his place stood someone carved out of ice, looking at me with something close to disgust.

There's a pressure behind my eyes that I refuse to let turn into tears, not here, not in this hallway of glass walls where anyone could look up and see the new Director of Real Estate falling apart on her first morning.

I don't know how long I stand there. Time stretches and warps. The hallway noise goes distant, muffled, like I'm underwater. My mind keeps replaying the last few minutes on a cruel loop — the way his hands trembled for a fraction of a second before he locked them down, the bitter sound that tore from his throat, the finality in his eyes when he told me to leave.

"...Ms. Anderson? Ms. Anderson, are you alright?"

The voice cuts through the static in my head like something heard underwater. I snap my head up, my vision clearing just enough to make out a woman standing a few feet away, an iPad clutched tightly against her chest, her expression carefully professional but edged with concern. She must have been speaking for a while. I have no idea how long I've been frozen outside his door like a ghost who forgot how to move.

"Huh?" It comes out soft and cracked.

Her voice softens further. "I'm so sorry to startle you. I'm Natalie, Mr. Sterling's executive assistant. I'm here to escort you to your office, Ms. Anderson. Everything's been prepared for your first day. If you'll follow me?"

I nod once, because speaking feels impossible. She turns and starts walking, and I fall into step behind her, arms wrapped tightly around myself, trying to hold the pieces together. Every step away from his office feels like I'm leaving something vital behind.

The executive floor is quieter than the rest of the building. Everything is polished and controlled — the glass walls, the pale stone underfoot, the discreet artwork lining the corridor. Natalie stops at a glass-walled corner office and taps her access card against the panel beside the door. The lock clicks.

"Here we are." She pushes the door open and steps aside.

The office is breathtaking, floor-to-ceiling glass looking out over the city below. A large desk sits near the window, its surface spotless except for a monitor, a keyboard, a phone, and a neat arrangement of stationery. A leather chair waits behind it, two guest chairs positioned in front. A bookshelf lines one wall, already filled with company reports, property files, and investment portfolios. There's a small sitting area near the window, a sleek cabinet, a whiteboard mounted beside the desk.

Everything is modern, high-end, and utterly devoid of life.

Natalie walks me through the basics — my access card, the internal systems, the office phone, the schedule waiting in my inbox. She points out the folders already arranged on my desk and explains that my assistant will be introduced later. I nod at the appropriate moments, though very little of what she says actually settles.

"Your first meeting with the investment team is at two," she reminds me.

"I'll be there."

"Good." She hesitates near the door. "If you need anything, just call me."

"Thank you."

She gives me one last look, then leaves, closing the door behind her.

I sink into the plush leather chair and stare blankly at the spotless desk. It feels like a gilded cage — beautiful, immaculate, and locked from the outside.

I pull out my phone and send a quick text to my parents, letting them know I've arrived and that my first day has officially begun. They hadn't been thrilled about me working at Sterling Group, not after everything that had happened between Jace and me. They'd been careful not to forbid it outright, but their hesitation had been impossible to miss — the concerned questions, the cautious silences, the way my mother had looked at me when I told her I'd applied.

I text Riley next. Her reply comes almost immediately.

Riley: So, funny story. I'm downstairs in the parking area. I brought you a coffee machine.

Me: A coffee machine?

Riley: Your mother mentioned you've been drinking coffee a lot ever since you came back. So, naturally, I got you a coffee machine. You'll need it, now that you're working at Sterling Group.

Me: Okay, I'm on my way.

I've become overly dependent on coffee over the past four years. At first it was one cup in the morning, during those endless weeks in London when sleep became impossible. Then it was two. Eventually coffee had replaced proper meals, conversations, sometimes entire nights of rest. It had kept me awake through lectures when I'd spent the night crying. It had steadied my hands before exams and filled the silence in my tiny apartment when I couldn't bear to hear myself think. Over time it had stopped being a drink and started being a ritual — the one thing in four years that never once let me down.

I leave the office and head for the elevators. The short walk feels longer under the weight of curious stares. I pass a man and a woman coming out of another office, and the woman leans toward her colleague, lowering her voice just enough that I only catch the shape of the words, not the words themselves. I don't need to hear them to know what they're about.

Riley is leaning against her car when I find her, the coffee machine box propped on her hip, sunglasses pushed up into her hair. She pulls me into a quick, fierce hug the second she sees my face.

"That bad?" she says, softer than I expect.

"Later," I manage. "Please."

She hands over the box without another word, squeezes my arm once, hard, and lets me go — the kind of mercy only a best friend knows how to give.

I ride the elevator back up alone, the box heavy and grounding in my arms. As I step off, the quiet hum of the floor hushes even further. Across the open floor plan, Natalie looks up from behind her desk, her eyes widening in surprise as she watches me struggle with the oversized box, then tilts her head, clearly wondering why the new Director of Real Estate Investment is hauling kitchen appliances through the office in her very first hour. I offer her a strained, apologetic smile and keep walking.

Back in my office, I set the box down and start unpacking — the machine itself, the water reservoir, the small bag of grounds I keep on hand the way other people keep gum. I find an outlet low on the wall beside the bookshelf and set the machine on the side table beside it, careful not to scratch the wood. The cord is stiff from travel. I kneel, work the plug into the socket, and reach for the switch.

A sharp crackle.

A bright white spark leaps from the outlet. Then another.

The machine hisses. A thin curl of gray smoke rises, and the sharp, metallic scent of burning plastic fills the air.

I freeze, hand still hovering near the switch, heart slamming against my ribs as the first real tendrils of smoke climb toward the ceiling.

A deafening siren shrieks through the ceiling speakers above, and a bright red strobe light begins flashing across the glass walls of my office.