Kneel For Me

I was seven minutes early, and it already felt like a mistake. The lift doors opened on the forty-third floor of Voss Enterprises. London glittered below like a prize that had already been claimed. I smoothed my cheap blazer and stepped out. The receptionist didn’t look up for a full thirty seconds. I counted. “Sera Vale,” I said finally. “Nine o’clock. Personal assistant for Mr. Voss. Permanent hire.” She typed, paused, typed again. “You’re listed as a temp.” “The contract was signed Thursday.” Her eyes finally lifted, measuring the distance between my high-street shoes and her marble desk. “Take a seat. He’ll call for you.” I sat. The chair probably cost more than my rent. My mother’s medication was £340 a month. The NHS top-up had run out in January. It was April. Six months. Survive six months here, build a buffer, and I’d have options again. Right now I had none. The frosted glass door at the end of the room opened. Not an assistant. Him. Lucian Voss. 34. Four billion, give or take. The man the financial press called untouchable. Tall, dark suit, collar open just enough to look deliberate. Jaw sharp enough to cut glass. Eyes the colour of deep water at night — cold, still, and already dissecting me. “Miss Vale.” His voice was low, flat, no warmth wasted on strangers. “You’re on time.” “I try to be.” He scanned me like a document he wasn’t sure was worth filing. No handshake. No welcome. “Follow me.” His office was a statement: floor-to-ceiling glass, London performing at his feet, desk like a black altar with nothing on it but a closed laptop and a single glass of water. No photos. No soul. He didn’t offer me a seat. “Your predecessor lasted eleven months. The one before her, four. Before that, six weeks.” He opened the laptop without looking at me. “I don’t say this to intimidate you.” “What do you say it for?” He looked up. Silence stretched, deliberate. “Accuracy. I don’t pretend the role is something it isn’t. Briefing at nine sharp, standing. Coffee on my desk before I arrive — black, exactly ninety degrees. My schedule is in the system. You don’t ask questions I’ve already answered. You don’t speak in meetings unless spoken to. You don’t leave this floor without telling someone.” I kept my face blank. “Is that everything?” “No.” His gaze pinned me. “I also don’t tolerate lateness, incompetence, or the delusion that proximity to power equals power. You are here to make my life run smoothly, Miss Vale. Nothing more. Clear?” The words landed like a lock clicking shut. I thought of my mother’s shaking hands. Of the rent due next week. “Crystal,” I said. He nodded, already back on his screen. “Your desk is outside. There’s a file. Read it.” I turned to leave. “Miss Vale.” I stopped. “The coffee.” Still flat. Still indifferent. “You have four minutes.” I read the file in under four. Made the coffee exactly ninety degrees. When I set it down on the precise right corner of his desk, he was on a call. He gestured without breaking stride. I placed it. Turned. “Wrong corner,” he said into the phone, calm as death. I moved it. He didn’t thank me. Didn’t look up. Back at my small glass desk — positioned so he could watch me every time he lifted his eyes — I opened his schedule. Day one. Eight hours and fifty-one minutes to go. I could do this. I had to. What I didn’t know, sitting there with his indifferent stare burning into the back of my skull, was how quickly this man would test every limit I thought I had. And how dangerous it would become when the most feared man in London started losing control… not because I took it, but because he chose to hand it over. For now, though, I had a schedule to memorise and a headache that paracetamol wasn’t fixing. Start where you are, my mother always said. I started.