When The Tables Turned

6. A Month Later

The digital clock on the dashboard of the town car glowed 7:15 PM.

.

In the back seat, the cabin was wrapped in a heavy, suffocating silence. Elliot sat with his laptop open, the cool blue light illuminating the sharp angles of his face as he scrolled through real estate acquisitions. Opposite him, Danika sat staring fixedly out the window, her posture rigid, her hands folded neatly over her lap.

For thirty days, this had been their routine. Not a single word had passed between them outside of the mandatory corporate necessities. At home, she moved like a ghost—keeping her room spotless, preparing her own simple meals, and avoiding the master living spaces whenever he was there. She went to work, sat in her gray cubicle, ground through spreadsheets until her eyes ached, and never once asked for a favor, an allowance bump, or an exception to the rules.

And she still refused to come straight home.

Elliot closed his laptop with a soft, decisive click. The mechanical sound broke the quiet, but Danika didn't even flinch or turn her head.

"We've missed the turnoff for the estate three times this week, Danika," Elliot said, his voice cutting through the hum of the air conditioning with absolute, unyielding calm. "The driver tells me you've been having him drop you off four blocks away from the mansion, wandering the commercial district alone for hours before walking back up the gate."

He shifted his weight, turning his dark, unreadable eyes toward her profile.

"If you're looking for a way to sneak out, or trying to find some pathetic loophole in the rules to escape your responsibilities, you're wasting your time. So tell me—what are you doing out in the cold for two hours every single night? Playing the martyr?"

“Mr. Sylvanus. At least I’m still working and attending everyday meetings.”

The quiet in the back of the town car dropped another degree, turning the air inside the leather-lined cabin as brittle as winter glass. Elliot did not blink. He leaned back against the plush upholstery, his shoulders squaring slightly as he absorbed the calculated, emotionless defense she had thrown up like a shield. She wasn't fighting back anymore, which was infinitely more infuriating than her old tantrums; she was enduring, retreating behind an impenetrable wall of corporate compliance and chilling indifference.

"You call it diligence," Elliot said, his voice dropping an octave, carrying the low, dangerous resonance of a man accustomed to having every variable accounted for. He shifted closer, closing the small physical distance between them on the bench seat until the faint, sterile scent of office paper and rain mingled with the clean linen of his shirt. "I call it a waste of energy. What are you proving, Danika? That you can sit in a cubicle for nine hours and then walk the pavement until your feet bleed just to avoid sharing oxygen with your younger brother? Is this your penance? Or are you just waiting for the moment you can slip a knife between my shoulder blades when I'm not looking?"

He reached out, his long fingers catching her chin with sudden, inescapable precision, forcing her face away from the tinted window and compelling her to meet his gaze. There was no hesitation in his grip—firm, commanding, and stripped of all familial pretense.

Her skin was cool, and her eyes—those sharp, defensive windows she kept barricaded behind a flat, deadened stare—flashed with a brief, hot spark of true defiance before she quickly locked them down again into that terrifying, empty void.

"Look at me when I speak to you," Elliot murmured, his thumb resting just beneath the curve of her jawline, feeling the erratic pulse hammering frantically against her skin despite her best efforts to remain a statue.

"You can play the stranger all you want. You can dress like a mid-level drone, you can swallow every insult Sarah throws at you, and you can wander the commercial district like a ghost until midnight. But you are a Viona. And more importantly, you live under my roof. Every second you spend out there playing the tragic heroine is time you're wasting."

He let go of her chin abruptly, dropping his hand back to his knee as if touching her burned him, though his eyes never left her face.

"Tomorrow, the marketing division moves into the new west wing restructuring phase," Elliot continued, turning his attention back to the dark window as the car swept past the wrought-iron gates of the estate and wound its way up the long, tree-lined driveway. "Your supervisor put your name down for the lead presentation on consumer retention metrics. That means you'll be standing in front of the board of directors—the same board members who used to watch you throw tantrums in the hallways when we were teenagers."

The car glided to a smooth stop under the grand portico of the mansion. The driver cut the engine, the sudden quiet of the cabin pressing down heavily on them.

"You can keep up this silent treatment if it comforts you," Elliot said, pushing his door open and stepping out into the cool evening air, looking back down at her through the open frame.

"You can pretend I don't exist. But tomorrow at 9:00 AM, you better not stumble over a single data point. Because if you humiliate yourself in that boardroom, I won't just dock your pay—I'll make sure everyone in this city knows that the great Danika Viona couldn't even survive a month at the bottom of the ladder she built for herself."