Blake POV:
Jaden swept into the company cafeteria as a pestilence might sweep through a banquet hall. The cheerful midday chatter dwindled and died as heads turned, tracking her imperious progress toward the hot food line.
She surveyed the carefully prepared trays of food with an expression of profound disgust.
“What is this?” she asked the chef behind the counter, poking a piece of roasted chicken with her long, red fingernail. “Is this creature even organic?”
The chef, a burly man with kind eyes and ‘Austen’ embroidered on his uniform, remained professional. “It is locally sourced, ma’am. Very fresh.”
Jaden scoffed. She produced a small, jewel-encrusted container from her ridiculously expensive Birkin bag. “No, thank you. I have brought my own.”
She opened the container, revealing a small portion of what appeared to be glistening, black fish roe. Caviar.
“I cannot be expected to consume… that,” she said, waving a dismissive hand at the food intended for hundreds of employees. “But I am feeling generous. I shall share.”
Before anyone could react, she moved to empty the entire container of caviar into the large pan of pasta salad on the buffet line.
“Ma’am, stop!” Austen moved with surprising speed, placing a firm hand over the pan, shielding it. His voice was calm but solid as granite. “You cannot do that.”
“Excuse me?” Jaden’s voice rose to a shrill peak.
“Company policy. Health and safety regulations,” Austen stated plainly. “We cannot have outside food, especially potential allergens, mixed with the general service. We could have an employee with a severe fish allergy. It is a massive liability.”
He was correct. It was the first principle of food service. A principle I had helped inscribe in the company’s operational manual.
Jaden looked at him as if he were an insect she was contemplating crushing under her heel. “Do you have any conception of what this costs?” she sneered, shaking the tub of caviar. “This little morsel is worth more than your entire weekly salary. I am improving your pathetic salad.”
“Ma’am, I am going to have to ask you to step away from the food line,” Austen said, his tone unwavering. He was a pillar of calm professionalism against her tempest of entitlement.
“You will ask me nothing,” she hissed, her face contorting with rage at being denied.
Instead of retreating, she did something so unbelievably reckless it stole the breath from my lungs. She produced her telephone and pressed a speed dial. A second later, Connor’s face materialized on the screen.
The background was unmistakable. It was the main conference room, the one with the panoramic view of the city. He was in the middle of the pitch. The pitch to Apex Ventures, the one that could secure our next five years of funding.
“Connor, darling,” Jaden whined, her voice instantly transmuting into that of a wounded child. “They are being so cruel to me.”
Connor’s expression, initially focused and severe, softened into one of indulgent concern. “Jaden? What is wrong? I am in the middle of something.”
“I know, I am so sorry to disturb you,” she said, angling the telephone so he could see the stoic chef and the general disquiet in the cafeteria. “But your staff… they are ganging up on me. This man,” she aimed her telephone at Austen, “he will not permit me to have lunch. He is yelling at me.”
Austen had not raised his voice once.
“What?” Connor’s brow furrowed. “Give him the telephone.”
Jaden’s lips curled into a triumphant smirk as she held the device out to Austen. “The CEO wishes to have a word with you.”
Austen took the telephone, his face impassive. I could hear Connor’s voice, no longer warm and indulgent, but clipped and sharp.
“What do you think you are doing?” Connor’s voice crackled through the small speaker. “Let her do whatever she wants. Do you understand me?”
Austen’s jaw tightened. “Sir, with all due respect, it is a violation of the health code. It is a serious safety risk.”
“I do not care about the health code!” Connor’s voice rose, laced with irritation. “I care about Jaden being happy. Now apologize to her and give her whatever she wants. Is that clear?”
The entire cafeteria was silent, observing this public execution. Employees stood frozen, trays in hand, their faces a mixture of fear and disbelief.
The telephone was handed back to Jaden. She was practically vibrating with glee.
“You see?” she whispered to Austen.
Then, she turned the telephone’s camera around, panning across the faces of the silent, watching employees, finally settling on me. I had followed her down, my hand still throbbing, needing to see how this drama would conclude.
“Connor, they are all just staring! They are all on his side!” she cried, a fabricated sob catching in her throat. “It is as if they all hate me. That girl from the lobby is here too, the one who burned herself. I believe she is their ringleader!”
Connor’s face, projected on the small screen, hardened. He was no longer merely annoyed; he was furious. Furious that this was interrupting his great moment. Furious that his authority was being questioned. Furious at me for being present.
The screen flickered as Jaden deliberately tilted the telephone, affording a glimpse of the men in suits seated across from Connor at the conference table. The investors. He was shaming his own staff, live, in front of the very people who held the company’s future in their hands, all to placate a manipulative parasite.
The moment he said the words, a dull ringing started in my ears. That invisible filament between us, spun from a thousand promises and late-night whispers, had been severed by his own hand. The air in the room grew thin, and I could not seem to draw a proper breath. This was not about a spilled coffee or a tub of caviar. This was about a fundamental flaw in his leadership, a blind spot so vast it threatened to swallow our entire company.
“That is it,” Connor’s voice was devoid of warmth. He addressed the entire cafeteria through the telephone’s speaker. “Every single one of you will apologize to Ms. Juarez. Right now. You will form a line and you will tell her you are sorry for upsetting her.”
He looked directly into the camera, his eyes finding mine. “You. The junior developer. You will begin. Apologize to Jaden. Now.”
The world seemed to slow. I was aware of the low hum of the refrigerators, the distant clatter of a dropped fork, the blood pounding in my ears. He was ordering me, the co-founder of his company, his fiancée, to publicly humiliate myself for this woman. He was choosing her, in this moment, over everything. Over the dignity of our employees. Over the integrity of our company. Over me.
The blueprint for the company we had drawn together, the future we had debated over countless nights, dissolved in my mind like a sketch left in the rain—the ink bleeding, the lines blurring into an unrecognizable smudge.
I took a step forward, moving into the center of the telephone’s view. I held up my red, scalded hand, the skin already beginning to blister. The pain was a dull, distant throb compared to the gaping wound in my chest.
I did not look at his digital image, but instead at the angry red of my own hand, tracing the blistering skin with the fingers of the other. The sting I felt against my fingertips was nothing to the chill that had settled deep in my bones. “Connor,” I asked, my voice quite steady, “are you certain? Are you absolutely, positively certain that is the order you wish to give me?”
