My Stepbrother's Dirty Little Secret novel Chapter 39

Raphael

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The Minister of Defense had been speaking for twelve minutes and thirty-two seconds.

A blue map of the city flickered on the wall, covered in red dots that moved and changed as our behavioral AI predicted the next hour of traffic and crime.

I sat at the head of the long glass table, my hands folded. To everyone else, I was listening. I was the CEO of Orion Vector Technologies, the man who sold them the future. But inside, my mind was running a different program.

An image of Gianna flashed across my brain.

It was like a static screenshot.

I saw the way the light hit her hair. It was a light brown color, pulled back into a bun so tight it looked painful. I remembered the small, stray strands that had escaped near her ears. Then there were her eyes, bright green, wide, and full of a panic she couldn't hide.

My mind moved down to her face. Her skin was pale, her lips looked full. They had been trembling slightly when I stepped behind her chair.

I looked at the Minister, nodding as he spoke about data encryption, but I was actually seeing the white fabric of Gianna’s shirt. I remembered the moment it opened. I saw the curve of her breasts, the soft rise of her skin against the harsh office lights.

The memory remained fixed, like a three-dimensional model rotating slowly in the dark space behind my eyes. It was not a pleasant memory, just a precise one.

The tactic itself had been obvious.

She had been cornered by the problem on her screen. The code maybe had trapped her in a loop she couldn't escape for a few minutes. The pressure of the deadline had tightened around her. So she reached for the simplest tool available.

Distraction.

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