The Baby Clause

The Ghost Girl

Damian's POV

She didn’t leave a name.

No number scribbled on the corner of a napkin. No scent-laced lipstick print on the glass. No voice message to replay and overanalyze like some tragic i***t trying to decipher subtext in silence.

Just absence. A vacuum where her presence used to be.

And in its place? A trail of heat and smoke and rain-soaked memory that refused to fade.

My sheets still smelled like her. Cinnamon and rain. That warm, sharp spice and that petrichor note that made something inside me tighten every time I walked past the bed. I’d changed the linen. Twice. Burned through a bottle of fabric softener I didn’t even know I owned.

It didn’t matter.

She lingered.

Not just in scent, but in every goddamn corner of my mind. Like a glitch in the code I couldn’t debug. A disruption I didn’t authorize. A woman I couldn’t unsee.

And the worst part?

The memory of her mouth, soft, full, and defiant. The way she kissed me back like it was an act of war. Like she hated that she wanted it just as much as I did.

It burned.

That mouth had argued with me, insulted me, then curled into a grin that made me forget my own rules. That night, she'd pulled something primal out of me. Something I didn’t even know was there.

It was pissing me off.

“You’re distracted.”

Roman’s voice cut through the quiet like a blade.

He was seated across from me, crisp suit, cleaner jawline, tapping his Montblanc pen against a stack of acquisition paperwork. But I barely heard him. Barely saw him.

Because she was still there. Behind my eyes. Under my skin.

I didn’t look at him. Just swirled the drink in my glass, letting the amber catch the light like it held the answers. Kept my face smooth, unreadable. Controlled.

We were in the Sterling Room, my inner sanctum. No one entered without clearance. No press. No assistants. No cameras. Just silence, the occasional whisper of glass on wood, and the weight of power shifting with every decision I made.

This was where empires were bought. Deals brokered. Secrets sold.

I’d sealed billion-dollar mergers in this room with three words and a glance. I’d broken competitors with less effort than it took to tie my cufflinks.

This space wasn’t meant for ghosts.

So why the hell couldn’t I stop thinking about her?

Not just thinking. Fixating.

“Sterling?” Roman’s tone was edged now, more direct. “The acquisition. We need a signature. Levenford’s circling like a vulture, and we both know they’ll gut the tech wing if they get a foot in.”

My eyes flicked down to the folder in front of me.

Black ink. Sharp red notations. Legal jargon detailing a deal worth more than some countries’ GDP.

And I hadn’t absorbed a single word of it in the last three minutes.

She didn’t even look back.

The thought came unbidden. Stupid. Pointless.

But it had weight.

No flinch. No awkward goodbye. She’d slipped out of my bed like a damn whisper and disappeared into the night. Like it hadn’t meant anything. Like I was just a convenient stop on the way to whatever came next.

I leaned back in my chair slowly, one ankle crossing over my knee, body language loose while my mind screamed.

“Send it to legal,” I said finally. My voice didn’t betray me. It never did. “You’ll get my signature by midnight.”

Roman frowned, drumming his fingers once on the folder. “We don’t have until midnight. Levenford’s flying in tomorrow. They’ll lowball us if they sense hesitation.”

I took a slow sip of my drink. Let the silence stretch.

“Don’t confuse silence with hesitation.”

Roman’s eyes narrowed. “That’s not what I’m confused about.”

He paused.

“This isn’t like you.”

There it was. The shift. The tell that something was off, and he’d finally noticed. Roman was sharp. He had to be, to work this close to me. But I wasn’t in the mood to be read.

I looked up then. Just enough for him to catch the warning in my gaze. The line he was toeing.

“That’ll be all, Roman.”

A flicker of resistance. Then he nodded, gathered the papers, and left without another word. Smart man.

The door clicked shut behind him.

And the silence that followed was louder than anything I’d heard all day.

I should’ve been thinking about Levenford. About the SterlingTech board vote next week. About that Singapore investor who wanted to pull funding from our AI division.

Instead?

I thought about her.

That damn girl with a hint of frosting on her cheek and fire in her eyes.

It was supposed to be a one-night mistake. A minor lapse in judgment. A moment of weakness I could file under forgettable and never speak of again.

Instead, she became the exception. The anomaly. The malfunction in the machine.

She didn’t flirt.

Didn’t flatter.

She didn’t want anything from me, which made her the only woman in the last five years who hadn’t tried to sell me something wrapped in fake affection.

She wanted out of that room more than she wanted me. And yet… she stayed.

God, she challenged me.

Mocked me to my face. Looked at me like I wasn’t Damian Sterling of Sterling Enterprises but just some arrogant man in a suit throwing money like confetti.

Her voice haunted me.

Soft. Sharp. Soaked in defiance.

She’d looked at me like she could see every layer I’d buried, past the steel, past the polish, right into the center of something I didn’t let anyone touch.

And the sickest part?

For half a second… I’d wanted her to.

No.

I sat forward. Clenched my jaw. Shoved the thought away like a hand I didn’t want holding mine.

This wasn’t about wanting.

It was about closure.

She didn’t leave a name. No trace. No contact.

And that wasn’t just inconvenient.

It was unacceptable.

Because I don’t do loose ends.

And I sure as hell don’t let people walk out of my life without permission.

I pressed the button on the comms panel, the soft click loud in the stillness.

“Cassian.”

My assistant’s voice came through immediately, professional and unreadable. “Yes, sir?”

“I want you to find someone.”

A pause. The kind that meant he was already sitting up straighter.

“Do I have a name?”

“No.”

Another pause. He was trained not to flinch, but I could hear it. That flicker of hesitation.

“Description?”

I stared at the glass in my hand. Empty. Cold now. My fingers tightened around it until the weight felt like something I could control.

“Mid-twenties. Brown skin. Brown curls. Big eyes. She was at the Sterling gala four Fridays ago. Pretty sure she slipped past security with a cake delivery. Bakery uniform. Black top. Jeans. Heels. She left through the back entrance sometime before dawn. Not on the guest list.”

Silence. Then the faint clatter of keys being struck, rapid-fire.

Cassian was good. Meticulous. If anyone could track down a ghost, it was him.

But even he hesitated before saying, “Sir… if she wasn’t registered, there won’t be any official record. No name. No credentials. She might’ve been an unlisted vendor. Or worse, off-the-books.”

Translation: She didn’t want to be found.

I clenched my jaw.

“I’m not interested in what she wanted. I want results.”

He hesitated again.

“Sir, it’s possible she used a borrowed uniform. A third-party gig. No digital footprint. If that’s the case, she might be...”

“Cassian,” I said, voice like ice beneath silk, “do I look like a man who tolerates dead ends?”

“No, sir.”

“Then treat this like any other target. Vendors. Catering companies. Rental kitchens. I don’t care if you have to cross-reference every bakery in a fifty-mile radius. I want her name.”

“She might not want to be found,” he said carefully.

I let out a short, humorless breath. A smile, but not the kind that reached the eyes.

“I don’t care what she wants.”

A beat.

Then: “I’ll handle it. Quietly.”

“You always do.”

I ended the call.

Silence rushed back in. Heavy. Loaded.

That ache was still there, dull, low, coiled behind my temples. Not lust. Not curiosity.

Something else.

I didn’t chase women. I didn’t wonder about them the next day. And I sure as hell didn’t order background checks on strangers who cracked my ego like a glass plate and walked out without a trace.

But she walked into my world uninvited.

Spoke to me like she wasn’t afraid.

Then vanished before I could decide what to do with her.

And now?

Now she lived in the space between my breath and my control.

Because I don’t forget.

I don’t forgive.

And I never let someone rewrite the rules of the game I created.

Especially not a woman who kissed me like it meant everything, then left like it meant nothing.

This wasn’t over.

Not by a long shot.