Just Before My Wedding: Trapped By My Ruthless Boss novel Chapter 39

Chapter 39

KISAREL.

I walked into that meeting room behind Mr. Stark and his senior staff and immediately understood why Carol had looked at me the way she did this morning.

The room changed the moment he walked in.

Nineteen senior staff and eight junior staff, all of them already seated, mid–conversation or mid–page or mid–breath, and every single one of them went still the moment Ocean Stark crossed that threshold. Conversations died, phones disappeared, everyone’s backs

straightened, and their eyes found the table in front of them or the wall ahead or anywhere that wasn’t directly in his line of sight.

Mr. Stark took his seat at the head of the table.

He didn’t open with pleasantries. He didn’t do a welcome or an acknowledgment of who was in the room. He simply sat, looked at the table in front of him for one moment, and said, “Let’s begin,” and the meeting began, because that was apparently all it took when you were Ocean Stark.

I stood beside him, with my laptop clutched to my chest, and looked around, feeling the paralysing confusion of not being told what to do next. Was there a seat for me? Was I supposed to stand? Was I meant to be doing something immediately or waiting to be directed or… There was a seat beside Mr. Stark, which wasn’t so far from him. Should I just…

“Sit.”

I heard him say through clenched jaws, like the words caused him physical pain, as he gestured toward the seat beside him.i nodded and sat.

The first report came from a senior portfolio analyst – a composed woman in her forties named Mrs. Bennet. She spoke about the third quarter performance of three managed

funds.

Oceans listened without moving.

That was the thing I noticed first about him in that room. He was completely, unnervingly still. No impatience, no small movements to indicate that time was passing, and he was a human being inside it. He just listened with his eyes locked on Mrs. Bennet, and the quality of his attention was the kind that made you want to make sure every single word coming out of your mouth wa

was being retained. Curate because you had the distinct impression that every single word

was being retained and would be referenced later.

I slowly got lost and my mind drifted back to what Carol

who had made one mistake four years ago

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and hadn’t worked a day, aid about the director

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Chapter 39

One mistake.

And I had made at least three this morning before ten o’clock.

I was still sitting with that thought when I realised I wasn’t doing anything.

I was sitting in the CEO’s board meeting with my hands folded on top of a closed laptop, listening, like I was an invited guest rather than the person whose job it was to-

Mr. Stark turned his head.

He looked at me with those cold, flat eyes and said, quietly enough that only the people closest to us could hear, “Do you need to be told to take notes, Miss Harry?”

The heat that crawled up my neck was immediate and total.

Oh, God. I didn’t even bring a notepad. But I didn’t let it be a hindrance. I opened my laptop so fast I almost knocked it to the floor and began typing away.

“The Meridian fund underperformed by four percent against the projected yield,” Mrs. Bennet said, and I felt the shift in the room.

“Against which projection?” Oceans asked. His voice was calm and conversational.

“The Q2 forward projection, sir.” She replied.

“Which was revised in August?”

She paused for a beat. “Yes.”

“So, you’re measuring against a revised projection that was already adjusted downward once.” His voice. Calm enough to deceive. “What was the performance against the original Q1 projection?”

The pause that followed was not long. But it was long enough for everyone in the room to feel what was coming next.

I observed carefully.

“Seven point two percent below, sir.”

“That’s what I want in the report going forward. Original projections. Not the revised ones.” He looked back at the file in front of him. “Continue.”

She continued. And I watched the faces around the table – the careful, controlled expressions of people who were extremely grateful they were not the ones being spoken to right now, and who were quietly recalculating whatever they were about to present to make sure it would hold up to the same

crutiny.

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All the while, Carol’s words kept replaying in my head… ‘if he decides…”

Now I understand better.

The second report had barely begun a junior analyst, presenting his department’s quarterly activity summary – when Mr. Stark reached for something on his table.

His hand stilled.

From where I was standing, I saw the almost imperceptible pause that made me realize he had reached for something and found it in the wrong place.

His fingers rested on the item for one second before he adjusted, calmly, without making a production of it, and picked up what he needed.

Then he turned and looked at me.

No one noticed what was happening.

But God.

The look.

It wasn’t anger. Anger would have been easier. Anger had heat and heat meant feeling and feeling meant somewhere inside it there was still something that could be reasoned with. This was none of those things.

This was pure emptiness and contempt.

I held his gaze for as long as I could and then my eyes dropped to my laptop screen because I was not built for whatever that look required a person to be built for.

He turned back to the man who was reporting, without a word.

I exhaled so carefully it barely moved my chest.

After what felt like an eternity, it was finally time for Mr. Stark to speak. Everyone paid rapt

attention.

I watched him reach for the files he had instructed me to arrange this morning, and somewhere deep down, I knew that if there was anything I had done one hundred percent right, it was the arrangements of those files. I had even cross–referenced his instructions twice to make sure everything was perfect.

But why did his expression stiffen the moment he opened the files? It was a micro–shift that most people in the room probably didn’t catch because they were looking at his face and not at what his face was doing underneath his face. at what his face was do

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But I

ught it immediately.

He was still for a moment.

Then he set the open file on the table in front of him, turned his head toward me very slowly, and looked at me.

The room followed his gaze.

Oh, God.

My palms were sweating all of a sudden as he held my gaze.

“Miss Harry.” His voice was calm. Pleasantly, terribly calm. “I gave you a specific order for these documents.” He counted his words. “A specific, written order. Would you like to explain to me why what I am holding does not reflect that order?”

Twenty–seven pairs of eyes on me.

The room was so quiet I could hear the air conditioning.

My cheeks burned. Heat rose from my chest to my throat, climbing up my neck and spreading across my face.

My fingers tightened around my laptop.

“I… I’m very…”

He didn’t let me finish. Almost as if that was his plan.

He just casually peeled his Bake

away from me, turned back to the table, and continued speaking to the room as though I had not opened my mouth at all.

Jesus.

Shame.

Something inside my chest dropped so fast, as if I had missed a step on a staircase I didn’t know I was standing on.

I did my best to keep my face completely, carefully still, as I felt the shame cover me from the top of my head to the soles of my feet.

Because if I lost control now and let anything slip even slightly out of place, I knew it wouldn’t just be embarrassment anymore.

It would be humiliation I wouldn’t recover from.

So I swallowed it.

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All of it.

Every burning, choking piece of it.

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