OFFICE HOURS

CHAPTER THREE: THE PRESENTATION

A week later, Lena Brooks was starting to believe she might survive working under Ethan Cole.

The whispers in the break room had mostly died down, replaced by new gossip about someone else’s promotion, someone else’s mistake. In the world of Hartwell & Co., scandal had a short shelf life.

Still, every time Ethan’s name came up, Lena felt a flutter of something she couldn’t name anticipation, maybe. Or dread. Or both.

She’d kept her head down all week, double-checking reports, fine-tuning schedules, and pretending not to notice the occasional glance from across the office. Ethan hadn’t called her into his office again, but she could feel his presence steady, quiet, watching.

On Thursday morning, that changed.

“Brooks,” Mr. Callahan barked, appearing over her desk like a thundercloud. “You’re at the Harrington presentation next week.”

She blinked. “Sir, I….. I thought the marketing team was handling that?”

“They were. Cole wants you on it now.”

Her pen slipped from her hand. “He… does?”

Callahan sighed like it was a personal inconvenience. “Apparently, you made an impression. Don’t make me regret this.”

And just like that, he was gone.

Lena sat frozen, her mind racing. The Harrington pitch was one of the biggest accounts of the quarter, high-stakes, high-pressure. The kind of meeting only senior executives usually attended.

And Ethan wanted her there.

For the next five days, she lived on coffee, deadlines, and nerves.

Ethan’s emails came late, often past midnight short, precise, always ending with “Thoughts?”

And she always had them. She stayed up drafting responses, researching data, and refining slides. She wanted to prove that his decision wasn’t a mistake.

By Monday morning, she’d memorized every statistic, every visual, every line of the pitch.

And still, she wasn’t ready for the moment she saw him.

He was waiting in the main conference room, crisp as ever in a charcoal suit, a faint hint of aftershave in the air. The rest of the team was setting up, but when he looked up and saw her, the noise of the room faded for a heartbeat.

“Good morning, Lena.”

“Morning, Mr……I mean, Ethan.”

His mouth twitched in amusement. “You remembered.”

She tried not to smile. “I’ve been practicing.”

“Good. You’ll need that confidence today.”

He moved closer, pointing at the slides on the projector. “You’ll handle the client engagement segment, the part about retention strategies.”

Her heart stopped. “Me?”

“You know it better than anyone.”

“I just organized the research.”

“Which means you understand it. Don’t underestimate yourself.”

And just like that, he walked off to speak to the rest of the team, leaving her with the faint warmth of his words lingering in her chest.

The meeting began at ten sharp.

The clients filed in sleek suits, sharp eyes, polite smiles that didn’t quite reach. Ethan greeted them with practiced charm, his tone smooth but confident.

Lena sat quietly at the far end of the table, her palms damp.

When it was her turn to speak, she rose, clicked to the next slide, and prayed her voice wouldn’t shake.

“Good morning. I’m Lena Brooks,” she began. “I’ll be walking you through our proposed client engagement structure…”

She expected her nerves to betray her but they didn’t. The words came easily, naturally. She knew this material inside out, and for once, she wasn’t just taking notes for someone else’s ideas,she was presenting her own.

Halfway through, she dared a glance at Ethan.

He was watching her. Not critically

attentively. Proudly, even.

Her heart fluttered.

Then, just as she finished, one of the clients leaned forward. “These projections are strong,” he said, “but how do you plan to handle engagement drop-off after the initial quarter?”

A murmur rippled through the room. That question wasn’t on the prep sheet.

Lena froze but only for a second.

“If we track engagement metrics weekly,” she said slowly, “we’ll be able to identify early signs of decline. The goal is to intervene before the pattern becomes a trend. By combining retention analytics with client feedback loops, we can personalize outreach strategies in real time.”

The client smiled, impressed. “That’s… actually brilliant.”

“Thank you,” she said softly.

When she sat down, Ethan’s gaze met hers again. There was no smile this time, just quiet acknowledgement. Approval.

And somehow, that meant more than applause.

After the meeting, the clients left, the team dispersed, and Lena finally allowed herself to exhale.

“Great job today,” Tom said, passing her a grin. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you planned that question.”

“Pure luck,” she laughed.

“Luck doesn’t talk like a strategist,” came another voice.

She turned. Ethan stood by the doorway, hands in his pockets, watching her.

“Can we talk for a minute?” he asked.

Tom raised an eyebrow at her, mouthing uh-oh before slipping out.

When they were alone, Ethan crossed the room, stopping just close enough for her to catch the faint scent of his cologne clean, warm, expensive cologne.

“You were excellent today,” he said simply. “Confidence. Clear. You handled pressure like you were born for it.”

She looked down, her cheeks warming. “Thank you. I was terrified.”

“You didn’t show it.”

“I was hoping you wouldn’t notice.”

“Oh, I noticed,” he said, voice softer now. “You always underestimate how much people see when you step forward.”

She met his eyes then steady, calm, searching. “I’m trying not to fade into the background anymore.”

“Good,” he said quietly. “The background doesn’t deserve you.”

Her breath caught. For a moment, neither spoke. The world outside their glass walls blurred into color and light.

Then Ethan blinked, breaking the moment. “You should take the rest of the day off.”

“I’m fine, really.”

“Consider it an order.”

She smiled. “You don’t seem like the type to hand out days off.”

“I’m not.” His tone softened. “But you earned it.”

She hesitated, then nodded. “Thank you, Ethan.”

“Anytime.”

As she turned to leave, she caught a glimpse of his reflection in the glass watching her go, expression unreadable.

And though she didn’t know why, she felt in her chest that strange, quiet certainty that her life was shifting, inch by inch, toward something she didn’t yet understand.

That night, as the city glowed outside her window, Lena opened her laptop and stared at the open email draft she’d been meaning to send him just a simple thank-you.

But the cursor blinked, waiting.

What could she possibly say that didn’t sound like too much?

Thank you for believing in me.

Thank you for seeing me.

Thank you for making me feel alive again.

She closed the laptop with a sigh. Some things, she decided, were better left unsent.

At least for now.