Just Before My Wedding: Trapped By My Ruthless Boss novel Chapter 104

Chapter 104

OCEANS.

Harold’s office was too clean for a man who claimed

o be overworked.

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That was the first thing I noticed when I walked in without knocking. His desk had files arranged in neat stacks, his laptop sat open in the center, and two untouched coffees were placed near the edge like he had ordered both and forgotten which one belonged to him.

He looked up from a report, took one look at my face, and closed the folder in front of him.

“No,” he said.

I stopped halfway with my hand still on the knob. “No?”

“No to whatever you’re about to bring in here with that face.”

“Asshole. You don’t know what I’m about to say.”

“I know you walked into my office at eleven in the morning without sending a message first. That means, it’s either someone is dead, someone is about to be dead, or you’re here to ruin my blood pressure with your love life.” He leaned back in his chair. “Since security didn’t follow you in, I’m guessing it’s the third one.”

“Or, maybe it’s the second. And you’re the one I’m about to kill,” I replied, shutting the door behind me.

Then my phone vibrated in my hand, and I looked down too fast and eagerly, like a bastard who had forgotten pride in a hallway somewhere.

But it was still nothing from Kiss.

Just a bank alert.

I locked the scree

slid the phone into

my pocket, and strolled toward his window.

Yea

Harold’s office was on the same floor as mine, but around the corner and down a short hallway, tucked into the west–facing side of the building. He had chosen it ago because the light was better in the afternoons and because he liked being

able to see the river from his window. I had never understood the appeal until now.

Now, standing at his window with my back to him, watching the grey water move like something trying to escape, understood exactly why a man would want a view that had nothing to do with the company.

“You’ve

pour

I didn

been standing there for ten minutes,” Harold said when we both went quiet for a while. “You could either sit down or yourself a drink. The pacing is making me nervous.”

turn around. “I haven’t been pacing.”

“You’ve been breathing like you need to punch something. That’s pacing adjacent.”

I turned, and he set down his pen.

“Talk to me.”

I crossed the room and sat in the chair opposite him, because if I stood any longer, I might walk out and continue pretending I had not come here because I had started losing the ability to think inside my own office.

I dragged a hand over my jaw. “I can’t touch her.”

Harold was quiet. “Moon?”

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Chapter 104

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“Who else?”

“You tried?”

I let out a breath that was almost a laugh. “She came to my room last night. Ran me a bath, put on a robe… The full performance.” I pressed my palm against the cold glass. “I kissed her. I touched her. I did everything I was supposed to do.”

“And?”

“And nothing.” I turned to face him. “I wasn’t hard, Harold. Not even close. She had her hand around my fucking cock, and I might as well have been made of stone.”

His eyes held mine for a second longer before he exhaled and looked down at his desk. “I see.”

“Don’t make me feel pathetic with that look,” I said when he looked back up at me.

“Feeling pathetic has never stopped you from sounding arrogant. Try

a new flavor.”

“Fucking asshole.” I hissed.

There was a pause.

al

“She was humiliated,” I said, in voice. “And I fucking did that to her.”

Harold rubbed his thumb along the edge of the closed folder. “Did you want to?”

“Humiliate her?”

“Touch her.”

4

The answer should have been complicated. But it wasn’t.

“No.”

He nodded slowly, as if I had confirmed something he already suspected and hated being right about.

“She thinks I hate her,” I added.

“Do you

still hate her?” He asked like I was in a fucking therapy session.

“She saved my life,” I replied.

“I didn’t ask what she did.”

“She bled for me.”

“I didn’t ask what you

“She’s going to be

owe.”

my wife.”

“And I didn’t ask what the announcement says.” His voice was calmer. “I asked if you still hate her.”

I looked away as a bitter pressure built behind my ribs, not because I did not know the answer, but because saying it felt like another betrayal added to the pile.

“I’m in love with Kisarel,” I said after a pause, but Harold said nothing.

“I’m in love with my PA. The woman who is engaged to another man.” I ran my hand over my face. “I’m in love with her, and I don’t know what to do about it.”

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Chapter 104

Harold leaned forward, resting his forearms on his desk. “How sure are

hard to name. I’ve watched you convince yourself of things before, You?”

His eyes held mine. “Love is easy to feel and I need to know if this is one of them.

I stared at him. “I’ve never been more certain of anything in my life,” I said, my voice sounding calmer than I felt on the inside.

“Certain enough that I tried to touch the woman I’m supposed to

Harold’s expression tightened, but he listened.

last night and my body treated it like a betrayal.”

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“Certain enough that her empty desk makes me lose my fucking mind. Certain enough that I can stand in a room with Moon crying in front of me and still wonder if Kiss has answered message. Certain enough that when Jace touches her. I have to put my hands in my pockets because if I don’t, I’ll rip his fingers off her one by one.”

My voice had lowered by the end.

“I’ve spent eleven years not feeling this. I fucking know what I feel.”

Harold absorbed my words. Then he sat back and picked up his pen, turning it between his fingers.

“I once told you to follow your heart.” He said.

“I remember.”

“I was wrong.”

I went still.

“1

“Not about what you feel,” Harold clarified. “About what you should do with it.” He set the pen down. “Oceans, a lot more is tied to this than Kisarel. You are marrying Moon in seven weeks. Kiss is marrying Jace in six. Those aren’t just dates on a calendar. They are contracts, agreements, alliances. Your engagement to Moon ties you to Fred’s holdings. It stabilizes the board. It keeps your enemies from circling.”

“I don’t care about any of that.”

“You do. Or you will, when the consequences hit.” Harold’s voice was calm. “I’m not saying this to hurt you. I’m saying it because

someone has to. You have spent six years searching for a woman who saved your life. You found her. Coincidentally, she turned out to be the woman you are mandated to marry in the first place. She’s living in your house, cooking your dinner, sleeping in your bed. And now you’re telling me you can’t touch her because you’re in love with someone else.”

The guilt pressed harder into my chest.

“I’m not saying you should force yourself to want Moon,” Harold continued. “I’m saying you need to decide what kind of man you’re going to be. The one who breaks his word because his heart leads him elsewhere? Or the one who honors his debts even when it costs him?”

I scoffed. “Don’t tell me about honor.”

“Not just honor. I’m talking about principle.” Harold leaned forward again. “You made a vow to yourself when you couldn’t find that woman. You said

you

would

protect

because in love with someone else.”

I closed my

“You can’t have both, Oceans

one and cherish the other. You

“I know.”

1. 01.

her.

Would give her everything she deserved. That vow didn’t disappear

“You can’t keep Kiss in your bed and Moon at your table. You can’t protect

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Chapter 104

Then choose.”

I opened my eyes and looked at him. “What if I choose wrong?”

70)

Harold let out the kind of smile that came from years of watching me make the same mistakes and hoping this time would be different.

“Then you live with it,” he said. “Same as the rest of us.”

***

Reeves called me at 2:17 p.m.

I answered before the first ring finished, probably because I was doing everything possible not to drown in the thoughts plaguing me, and the fact that I expected Kiss to have resumed work today, despite my conversation with Harold.

But she was still not here.

I had called her more times than I can count since the hospital. She hadn’t answered once. I had sent six texts. She had replied to exactly two:

I’m fine, and please stop.

That was it.

She was shutting me out, and I deserved it. But that didn’t make the silence any easier to swallow.

“Sir, we have a visual on the Luna Park footage,” Reeves said.

Every thought in my head stopped moving.

I straightened slowly behind my desk. “Talk.”

“Someone bumped into Miss Harry. It was small enough to feel like an accident, but when I looked into it,

it wasn’t.”

“Tell me you’ve got him?” I asked, running a hand through my hair as Jace’s panicked face flashed across my mind’s eye. “The camera near the exact spot where she was bumped into was blurry–too much movement. Too many people crossing the frame. But I had the surrounding feeds pulled from the vendor exit, the east gate, and the parking corridor.”

My fingers tightened around the phone. “And?”

“We caught his face on the east gate camera eight minutes after contact. Same jacket. Same cap. He removed the cap before getting into a delivery van, probably thinking he was already past the blind spot.”

I stood up, loosening my tie, already imagining a thousand ways to punish him for what he did to Kiss. “Who the fuck is he?”

“Derek Walsh,” Reeves said. “Temporary vendor staff. Three prior arrests, nothing violent. He was registered under a catering contractor for the night market. No permanent address on file, but we found two recent motel payments under a card linked to him. One near the east exit, one downtown.”

“Send me everything.”

“Already did.”

My phone vibrated against my ear.

1 lowered it enough to open

the message.

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Chapter 104.

A still image filled the screen.

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A man in a jacket, his face turned partially toward the camera, mouth slightly open like he was speaking to someone outside

the frame.

He had quite an ordinary, forgettable face. The kind of face that could pass you in a crowd and disappear before your mind bothered to keep it.

This was the man who had fucking touched her, put something in her body, and left her pale in a hospital bed while Jace held her hand like he had had the fucking right to.

A quiet heat moved through my blood.

“Where is he now?” I asked.

“We’re narrowing that down. My men are checking the first motel. I’ll have the second covered within fifteen minutes.”

I sucked in a breath through my teeth..

“I don’t want him arrested,” I said. “I want him breathing when I get there.”

Reeves paused. “Understood, sir.”

“Send me the address. Keep an eye on the motel. No one goes near him until I arrive.

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