His Fated Temptation

YOU’RE FIRED

Seraphina sighs, feeling exhausted after the meeting at the hall. She drops into the chair in her office, ready to melt into it. Her bones hurt, her brain is fried, and her face still twitches from the stress of that meeting at the hall. And then... the landline rings.

"For crying out loud, can't I get even a minute's rest?"

She grabs the receiver anyway. "Yes, Seraphina speaking."

"Miss Seraphina," Mr. David's voice says, sounding unusually frantic. "I have just been informed that the CEO wants to meet every newly recruited employee in the conference room personally."

Of course, he does. What a pain in the actual ass. What did he just do in the hall then? Stretch his legs? Admire the ceiling? Practice his brooding?

A hundred questions rolls in her head and she wanted to ask them all, instead all she says is, "Okay, Mr. David, I will be there in a jiffy, sir."

Well, that's new. She has done a tangible amount of research on this company and she knows for a fact that the CEO doesn't meet with anyone except high rankers or people like secretaries who report directly to him, like she will be doing soon enough. But now, he wants to meet every single new employee and personally?

She narrows her eyes, wondering why.

She doesn't think too much about it. She's too tired to do so.

"When will we meet him?"

"Now!"

"Now?" She couldn't help but ask. Why now? Couldn't they allow her to take just a little rest?

"That damn receptionist." She mutters to herself.

Seraphina genuinely pictured dunking the woman's head in a sink and holding it down until oxygen said goodbye.

"Yes now, he will come back soon and I want y'all to be ready and most importantly," he senses her despair. "Don't be afraid of him, okay? Although he is strict and can sometimes be hard to work with, he is a very good person." Mr. David tries to assure her.

Seraphina only smiles lightly over the phone. Afraid of who? Someone she's going to kill real soon. Oh, please.

After some last minute instructions, advice on how to 'please' Mr. CEO, and a ridiculous checklist of things to do and what not to do, Mr. David hangs up the phone.

Seraphina also puts the receiver down with a soft thud. Finally, she's going to meet him face to face this time. Not that they haven't met before... Just not professionally.

"Ahhh, Seraphina," her subconscious groans at her. "I just hope you haven't doomed this mission."

She shakes the voice away, reassuring herself over and over again that nothing is going to go wrong. With a reassured mind, she stands up from her seat. According to Mr. David, the CEO is going to meet the new recruitments from the marketing department first and then Mr. Lucien's assistant, that is Amara, and then his own secretary, the stainer of his suit with coffee.

"That's me!" Seraphina bits her lips. "Fantastic."

Again, according to Mr. David, maybe the CEO will assign her some more work and he might need her presence after the meeting.

Well, it is good she gets to meet the CEO. That way, she would get the chance to observe him during their first meeting.

Closer access. The closer the target.

She gets up and walks towards the elevator with a notepad in case he assigns her some work just as Mr. David said.

An hour earlier, after the meeting and stress at the hall, she'd walked around the company building, memorizing exits, cameras, blind spots. And she has to admit— the place is beautiful. Whoever designed it deserves a medal.

She recalls that the CEO’s office is just opposite hers for easy access when she wants to deliver the reports and when he needs her urgently while the conference room where she would meet him was one floor down.

She enters the elevator and its doors slide shut. The metal reflects her tired face back to her.

"Finally," she whispers. "I'm going to meet this cold CEO everyone talks about but haven't seen."

But why is her heartbeat escalating whenever she thinks about meeting him.

She takes a couple of deep breaths and when the elevator finally reaches the floor, she steps out of it and finds that other new recruits are already there.

She makes a headcount of how many they were here. They were just twelve consisting of only four males and the rest were females.

Seraphina wasn't surprised when she saw three of the men have surrounded Amara like bees around honey, talking to her in their most pathetic , charming voices.

She goes near to where they were sitting and she sits on one of the seats silently, trying to play her role. The role of the quiet secretary. But she prays that she will be able to play this role as she knows her personality like the back of her hands, especially now that those three men were looking at her. Not with curious eyes or friendly eyes. With contempt that says 'you disgust me'.

Nice.

"Ahh, Lord help me," she prays with all her heart.

But it seems like again, the universe wanted this day to be hard for her or extremely annoying. She hears one of the males, the one with badly-gelled hair, cheap cologne— he leans back and says loudly.

"Hello, Glass Nerd, hope you can see where you are heading to with those four eyes of yours."

Seraphina smiles inwardly.

The jerk was trying to be funny. Well, he actually succeeded because the two other morons beside him generate giggles when he finishes.

Seraphina looks at Amara from her peripheral view and finds her best friend rolling her eyes.

If not for the circumstance, she and Amara would've laughed at how painfully lame these men were. But today, they have to be in character for now.

From their chatter, Seraphina gets to know their names. The clown who made the bad joke is Andrew and the other sidekick hyenas are Vincent and John.

Seraphina tries to keep her expression calm. After what feels like forever, she glances at her watch and she tries to act cool when she notices that she has been here for twenty minutes now. When will the CEO call them in?

Oh, of course he won't. He doesn't have the courtesy to know that people have other things to do and have planned their day already.

Rich men like him love making others wait and even after they wait. Then they show up and act like waiting for them is a privilege you begged. for

For the millionth time today, Seraphina sighs internally.

The three men, after their failed attempt on picking on her, turned their slimy charm back to Amara. Seraphina rolls her eyes.

She decides to get a cup of water from the dispenser across the room as her throat is all parched. Her stomach grumbles and that reminds Seraphina that she hasn't eaten anything all day. The only beverage that she could've used to get her day started was spilled on that grumpy rich ass's suit.

Thinking of it now, Seraphina realizes that technically, it was kind of her fault that her precious coffee got spilled and f**k, she didn't apologize.

Doomed!

That was one word to describe her predicament.

Andrew stretches his leg out, obviously calculating the perfect moment to trip her, and thanks to Seraphina's fast reflexes, she notices this and smiles. What's the best way to teach this jerk a lesson other than to fall heavily on his leg, making sure that she exerts the right amount of force to break the bone. With the right amount of pressure she could pull that off. It would be very satisfying. But just as she was about to do that, she sees the conference room door click open and because the glass door is partially transparent, Seraphina was able to see that it was the CEO coming out.

She pauses, then smirks. She knows that werewolf hearing is higher than humans like her, and they easily catch even the tiniest of sounds. So to give this jerk a beautiful lesson and to equally attract the CEOs attention—no, not attract. She doesn't need his attention yet. In fact, she absolutely does not need it. She convinces herself that she doesn't. Why did she think of that?

Still, she lets her knees buckle dramatically and throws herself forward. "Ahh!" She screams as if terrified, falling like she has been kicked with full force.

The office door bursts open and she sees the almighty CEO towering above her. All dark energy and calm authority.

Her plan worked. Perfect. She is about to rejoice mentally but what she sees on his face stops her.

'You've got to be kidding me.' she curses internally. 'This grumpy rich ass is actually smirking wickedly above me?'

Even though his eyes are unreadable, I just feel deep down that he's gloating over this. Actually enjoying my humiliation. I am in an embarrassing position at his feet. Ahhh, this day is a joke. I would've just apologized this morning. Was that smirk on his face actually telling her that he enjoys seeing her like this?

This man has declared war.

But why does she feel sad that he looked at her like that? Why did her chest hurt?

Their eyes lock. They both keep looking intensely at each other. Until someone clears his throat, snapping the moment like a string.

Seraphina forces herself to move and just as she pushes up to stand, someone stretches his hand to her. She knows it can't be Kael but she half expects it to be him.

What was wrong with her? Her feelings are all over the place. Get a hold of yourself, Seraphina.

She stares at the hand for a second before reaching out to grab it.

The person pulls her up and makes her stand on her feet.

Seraphina's eyes travel from the hand and then to its owner's face. If she wasn't trained to hide her expressions, she would have ratted them out right there and then. The hand on hers belongs to no one but Kieran. How did he get here? Last she checked, he wasn't supposed to be here with them. He was supposed to be on the outside watching over her and Amara from a distance.

When she saw him stand behind Kael, she gasped internally. He is the CEO's bodyguard? How in the world did he pull that off?

"T-Thank you," she says, acting her character. She smiles gratefully at him.

Immediately, she pulls herself together, dusting her long gown but what she hears next makes her heart thump wildly. Her head is still down when…

Kael's voice slices through the room. Cold. Hard. And final.

"You're fired!"

Her heart slams against her ribs.

‘OH GOD! LIKE I SAID, I WAS DOOMED FOR SURE.’