HIS STRIPPER, HIS WIFE novel Chapter 37

Chapter 37

Chapter 37

Bianca

10 vouchers

My days in Adrian’s office had been cut short recently. For the past week or so, Felix had been pulling me and a few others out to do site visits, project overviews, the kind of work that meant you were in a car more than you were at a desk.

It was fine, honestly different. Some of the project sites were interesting and it kept things moving, which was better than sitting still with too much time to think.

But this morning I was finally back, desk, laptop, the familiar hum of the office building doing its thing. I settled in, made myself comfortable and opened my emails.

Adrian was not there and something about the room felt off and it took me a minute to place it. His chair was empty. His desk was exactly as he left it, nothing moved, nothing out of place, but no him.

I checked the time, he was never this late. Not without reason, not without some kind of message or instruction passed down through Felix or someone else from the higher team. I went through my emails again just to be sure, nothing from him. Nothing from anyone about him.

I sat back in my chair, should I call him? Then I remembered that I did not have his number and almost laughed out loud at myself for even considering it for two full seconds.

I did not have my boss’s personal phone number, I thought that wasn’t normal until I got here and noticed it was here. That was how they operated in this place, the fact that I had spent two seconds actually thinking about calling him said a lot more about the state of my brain than anything else.

I shook my head, opened the investor report I had been working on and got back to it.As it turned out, the absence of certain distractions did wonders for productivity. I moved through my tasks faster than I had in days.

C

No footsteps across the room, no chair shifting, no presence at the corner of my vision pulling my attention sideways every few minutes. I finished two full sections before ten and was well into the third by the time I heard the door.

It opened and he walked in. I looked up automatically.

“Good morning, sir.”

“Good morning.” He did not stop, he went straight to his desk, picked something up, tucked it under his arm and walked right back out without so much as even sitting down. The whole thing took maybe twenty five seconds.

I stared at the door after it closed.

C

“Okay, that’s…” I didn’t get the right words so I turned back to my screen, none of my business actually. I went back to the report and stayed there until I had done everything I needed to do for the day.

By the time I saved and closed the document, I felt genuinely good about the work, the clean kind of satisfaction that came from finishing something properly.

I packed my things and stood up and was halfway to the door when Felix appeared in it.

Seeing the look on his face, I already feel like whatever he was about to say was going to inconvenience me. Relaxed on the surface, apologetic somewhere underneath it.

“Bianca.” He smiled the way people smiled when they were about to ask you for something. “Quick thing.”

I knew it was not a quick thing, the short version was this, there were two sensitive files that needed to be personally delivered today and for reasons that Felix did not fully explain. I was the person being sent to do it.

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13:54 Thu, Jul 23 đ đ )) •

Chapter 37

10 vouchers

One file was at the company’s store, the second was at a separate address he would send to me later. The locations were uptown. If it ran long and I couldn’t make it back home by 9pm, a hotel near the area would be booked for me and I could just head there instead.

I looked at him. He looked back at me with the look of someone who had already submitted the assignment and was just here for the handover.

“Okay,” I finally said, because there was no version of this conversation where I could even say anything else, everything has been planned out.

I got the first file from the store, collected the address of the first delivery from the front desk and went downstairs to get a cab.

The first stop turned out to be the kind of meeting that looked like it was going to take forty five minutes and ended in twenty. The file was for the CEO of one of their partner companies, one of those brief, professional exchanges where you hand something over, confirm receipt, exchange a few polite sentences and leave.

It was easy, straightforward and I was back on the street with my bag on my shoulder. Felix sent me the second address while I was waiting for a cab.

I typed it in, got in when it arrived and watched the city change as we moved. The buildings got quieter, the streets got wider. By the time the cab slowed down and the driver told me we were close, the area had shifted into something that looked distinctly residential.

Wide roads, trees planted at intervals, gates you had to look at twice to notice because they blended into the walls around them. I checked the address again and I called Felix.

“Yes, you’re in the right place,” he said before I could finish asking. “Just go in. Someone will be there.”

“It’s a residential area Felix.”

“I know.”

I looked out the window at the address on the wall, then I paid the driver and got out.

The gate was already open, or rather, someone opened it when I approached, a man who nodded at me and stepped aside without a word. The door to the main building was the same, another person, same quiet efficiency.

I walked in, I am not entirely sure what I was expecting but it was not this. The inside was exactly what it looked like from the outside, a private home.

A well put together one, the kind that had been decorated with actual thought rather than just money thrown at it, warm light, good furniture, the kind of quiet that came with thick walls and proper insulation.

I looked around as I walked further in, this was someone’s house.

I took the envelope out of my bag carefully, there was a table near the entrance and I moved toward it.

I was about to set the envelope down when something made me stop, the name on it.

I had been focused on getting here, on the address and the cab and the right gate and not embarrassing myself in front of the silent door people, and it had not occurred to me until this exact second to look properly at who I was delivering to.

I read the name and I read it again. “No way.” The words came out quietly.

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