Chapter 30 — Aftermath Obsession
308 Words
Aurora spent the morning trying to focus on work, but her attention kept slipping in ways she couldn’t fully control. Even simple tasks that normally held her interest felt harder to stay locked into, as if something at the back of her mind kept pulling her away from every document she touched.
She told herself it was just fatigue, nothing more than a busy schedule catching up with her, but the explanation didn’t hold for long.
Seeing Cassian in the conference room confirmed that.
He was already there when she arrived, standing with senior executives as they went through reports. Nothing about him suggested anything unusual. He looked exactly the same as always—calm, composed, precise in the way he carried himself, as if nothing outside the room ever had the power to unsettle him.
That was what made it worse.
Because she knew something had changed.
The meeting progressed normally. Departments presented updates, figures were reviewed, decisions were made without interruption. On paper, everything was professional and controlled. Yet Aurora found herself noticing how much effort it took to maintain that appearance of normality.
At some point during the discussion, her attention drifted toward him without intention. She caught herself doing it, and before she could look away properly, she realized he had already been looking in her direction.
Not openly. Not in a way that interrupted anything.
Just there.
Focused.
Present in a way that felt harder to ignore than anything spoken in the room.
She forced her attention back to the documents in front of her, but the awareness stayed with her for the rest of the meeting, sitting beneath every word spoken until it finally ended.
By the time everyone began to leave, she felt more drained than she could explain, and none of it had anything to do with the work itself.
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