His Obsession

Chapter 4: The Private Floor

The 43rd floor didn't officially exist.

Not on the directory in the lobby. Not on the elevator panel, which skipped cleanly from 42 to 44 like the number had been erased. Amelia had noticed it her first day and assumed it was some kind of maintenance floor, storage, nothing worth thinking about.

She knew better now.

It took her three days to find an excuse to be near it.

The opportunity came on a Thursday, when Mrs. Grey handed her a stack of documents with barely a glance. "Mr. Blackwood needs these signed and returned to his private office by noon. Take the east elevator. Use his key card." She held out a slim black card, unmarked except for a small silver B engraved in the corner. "Don't lose this. And don't wander."

Don't wander.

As if she hadn't been thinking about nothing else for three days.

Amelia took the card like it was made of glass. "Got it."

"I mean it, Miss Carter." Mrs. Grey's sharp eyes softened, just slightly, into something like warning. "Whatever you think is up there…it's not worth the trouble it'll cause you."

Amelia's pulse jumped. "What makes you think I think anything's up there?"

Mrs. Grey didn't answer. She just turned back to her desk, and the conversation was over.

The east elevator was smaller than the others, tucked behind a door that required the key card just to open. Amelia stepped inside, heart hammering, and pressed the single unmarked button beneath the number 44.

The elevator didn't ask for confirmation. It simply began to rise, smooth and silent, like it already knew where she needed to go.

When the doors opened, the air felt different. Colder. Quieter.

There was no glass up here. No open floor plan, no busy assistants typing at desks. Just a long, dim corridor with dark wood panelling and a handful of closed doors, each unmarked.

Amelia stepped out slowly, documents clutched to her chest like a shield.

Mr. Blackwood's private office is at the end of the hall, Mrs. Grey had said. Do not stop anywhere else.

She told herself she wouldn't.

She lasted about twenty feet.

There was a door on her left, slightly ajar…just an inch, just enough for a sliver of light to spill into the hallway. Amelia slowed without meaning to. She told herself she was only walking past. She told herself her feet weren't stopping.

They stopped.

Through the gap, she could see part of a room. A study, maybe. Bookshelves. A large framed photograph on the far wall, half-lit by a lamp.

She shouldn't look.

She looked.

The photograph showed a family…a mother, a father, two children, all dressed in white, all smiling in a way that felt staged and warm at once. Amelia recognized a younger Adrian immediately, maybe ten years old, gap-toothed, nothing like the man she worked for now. Beside him stood a girl who had to be Victoria.

But it wasn't the family photo that made Amelia's breath catch.

It was the second photo, smaller, tucked into the corner of the frame like it had been added later. A single photo of a man standing beside Adrian's father, both of them shaking hands, both of them smiling at a groundbreaking ceremony.

The man beside Adrian's father was younger. Thinner. But Amelia would know that face anywhere.

Her own father.

"You're not supposed to be here."

Amelia spun around so fast she nearly dropped the documents.

Adrian stood a few feet away, arms crossed, his expression unreadable in the dim hallway light. She had no idea how long he'd been standing there. Long enough, judging by his face, to know exactly what she'd been looking at.

"I got lost," she said, too fast, too obviously a lie.

"This hallway has four doors and one exit. You didn't get lost." He stepped closer, and there was something dangerous in the quiet of his voice, something that made her want to step back even as she forced herself to hold still. "You stopped at my study on purpose."

"The door was open."

"The door is never open." His eyes flicked past her, to the study, and something crossed his face…frustration, maybe, or fear, though Amelia couldn't imagine Adrian Blackwood being afraid of anything. "Mrs. Grey must have forgotten to close it."

"Adrian." She said his name deliberately this time, ignoring rule ten completely. "That's my father in that photo. With your father. At what looked like a groundbreaking ceremony. Explain that to me."

"I don't owe you an explanation."

"You do if it involves my family."

For a long moment, he said nothing. Amelia watched him war with himself…she could see it, actually see the calculation happening behind his eyes, weighing what to say and what to bury.

"Your father worked with my father," he said finally, each word measured like it cost him something. "Years ago. Before either of us were running anything."

"Worked with him how? Doing what?"

"That's not something I'm going to discuss in a hallway."

"Then discuss it somewhere else. I'll wait."

"No." The word came out sharper than anything he'd said yet, final in a way that closed the conversation entirely. "You won't be discussing this at all, Miss Carter. Not with me. Not with your sister. Not with anyone."

Amelia's spine straightened. "You don't get to tell me what I can and can't ask about my own father."

"I do when it's dangerous."

The word landed between them and sat there, heavy.

Dangerous.

Amelia felt something cold slide down her back. "Dangerous how?"

Adrian's jaw tightened. For a second…just a second…she thought he might actually tell her. His mouth opened slightly, like the words were right there, ready.

Then his phone buzzed in his pocket, and whatever had almost happened closed itself off completely.

He checked the screen, and his whole posture changed, straightening, hardening. "I have to take this."

"Adrian…"

"Give Mrs. Grey the documents. Then go back downstairs." He was already walking away, phone against his ear, voice dropping into something clipped and businesslike. "And Miss Carter…"

She waited.

He glanced back at her, just once, and for a moment the coldness slipped, and what was underneath it looked almost like worry.

"Stop asking questions you're not ready for the answers."

He disappeared around the corner, voice fading into the phone call, leaving Amelia alone in the dim hallway with her heart pounding and a photograph burned into her memory that she couldn't explain and couldn't forget.

Dangerous.

He'd said dangerous like he knew exactly what that word meant. Like he'd seen what it cost before.

Amelia looked back at the study door, now closed…she hadn't heard anyone close it, but it was shut tight, like it had never been open at all.

She thought about calling Sophie again. She thought about calling her father directly and just asking him outright.

Instead, she stood in that cold, quiet hallway a moment longer, staring at the space where the photograph had been, and made herself a promise.

Whatever Adrian Blackwood was protecting her from, she was going to find out what it was…even if it meant breaking every single rule on that list to do it.