Under Her Command:The Billionaire’s Associate

Chapter 9: The Ghost In The Glass

At 2:00 AM, the transcription was finally finished. My fingers were stained with ink, and my neck felt like it was locked in a permanent vise. I walked toward Jace’s private quarters to deliver the work, my heart thumping against my ribs. I expected her to be asleep, or perhaps to dismiss me with a cold nod through the door.

Instead, the heavy oak door was ajar, a sliver of moonlight spilling out into the hallway.

I pushed it open tentatively. Jace wasn't in bed. She was sitting on the expansive balcony, the glass doors slid wide to let in the salt-heavy air of the Atlantic. She had changed into a simple black silk slip, her hair down and flowing over her shoulders. She looked smaller, more human, and achingly beautiful.

"The file is finished, Director," I whispered, holding out the stack of handwritten pages.

She didn't turn around immediately. She watched the waves for a long moment before gesturing for me to join her. "Come here, Elena."

I walked to the railing. The breeze was cool, a welcome balm to my feverish skin. Jace reached out and took the pages, but she didn't look at them. She set them on the table and instead reached out, her fingers catching a stray lock of my hair that the wind had blown across my face.

"My father used to say that people like us don't get to have friends," she said, her voice so low it was almost lost to the sea. "He said that every person in your life is either a ladder or a weight. I’ve spent ten years cutting the weights loose. And then I found you."

She looked at me then, her eyes reflecting the moonlight. There was a raw, naked longing there that terrified me. "You’re the only person who sees me when the lights go out, Elena. The only one who knows that the Ice Queen is just a mask I wear so I don't get swallowed whole. That makes you the most dangerous thing in my life."

For a second, the distance between us vanished. I could have reached out. I could have kissed her. But the "Strict" rules she had forged between us held me back. I was her Associate. I was her debt. And until that debt was paid, I was a ghost in her glass house.