By three o'clock, Mila had moved past the Harbor District proposal and into the secondary files.
These were more market analysis, competitor positioning, the kind of granular detail work that most people would find tedious but that she found oddly satisfying.
There was a logic to it, a pattern, that she enjoyed. Once you understood the framework, everything else fell into place like puzzle pieces that had been waiting for the right hands to arrange them.
All in all, the office had settled into a rhythm that felt almost comfortable.
Dante was on his phone periodically, his voice low and clipped when he spoke. His language of choice was Italian mostly, interjected with a few English swear words here and there. It sounded like important business.
After one such phone call, he had left for a meeting, and she'd barely noticed his absence because she'd been too absorbed in the work.
But now he was back, she was aware of him once again. Acutely, frustratingly aware.
It was the kind of awareness that made her hyperconscious of every movement she made.
Second guessing the way she turned pages, the way she leaned forward when she was concentrating, the way her hair fell across her shoulder when she tilted her head to read a particularly dense section of text, she was starting to drive herself crazy.
She wanted to ignore it. Wanted to pretend that his presence didn't register on some frequency that had nothing to do with logic and everything to do with the fact that he was dangerous and powerful and had kidnapped her and was somehow still the most interesting person in the room.
Mila circled another number, this one in the competitor analysis. There was a discrepancy, but smaller than the first one. However, even if it wasn't enough to tank the project, it would definitely need addressing before the proposal went to the board.
Humming to herself, she made a note in the margin—check with finance team—and went back to reading.
"You're done for the day."
Mila's pen stilled the moment the words echoed around the office as if she didn't really understand what he was trying to say. "But I'm not done," she replied, blinking owlishly up at him. "I can't stop now."
"Then how about I put it this way," said Dante, moving around his desk so that he was leaning against the front of it, his arms crossed in front of him. "I'm done for the day. Most people are done for the day. Therefore, you are done for the day."
"From what I have seen, most people aren't very good at their jobs." Mila raised an eyebrow before she looked down and turned the page in front of her, her eyes tracking across the numbers. "I assume you didn't hire me to be most people."
Dante didn't respond immediately but she could feel him watching her, that steady, assessing gaze that made her skin feel too tight.
"What did you find?" he asked after a long moment.
Mila set down her pencil and finally looked at him. He was in the same relaxed position as before, his suit jacket unbuttoned and his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He looked like he'd been in meetings all afternoon, but there was something in his expression that suggested he was more interested in what she had to say than whatever had happened in those meetings.
"Three discrepancies," she replied at last. "The big one we already talked about, but there are another two that are smaller. At first glance, they are fine, but they're still problems if anyone actually reads the fine print." She gestured to the file. "Your team is good, but they're not detail-oriented. They're thinking big picture. Nobody's checking the math."
"And you are."
"Obviously." She picked up her pencil again, but she didn't go back to reading. "Isn't that what you asked me to do? To find the things people miss because they're too busy looking at the forest to notice the trees."
Dante stood and crossed to her desk. It wasn't a dramatic movement—just a simple shift of his weight, a few steps across the hardwood floor—but it felt like he was stalking her in a way that made her heart jump just a bit.
He stopped beside her chair, close enough that she could smell his cologne and something else. Something that was just him. Something that made her want to lean closer and simultaneously want to put distance between them.
She didn't do either. Instead, she just sat there, her pencil poised over the page, and waited.
"Show me," he said at last.
Mila turned the file toward him, pointing to the first discrepancy with her pencil. "Here. The timeline doesn't account for municipal delays. Here—" she flipped to the next page, "—the competitor analysis is using outdated market data. And here—" another page, "—the revenue projections don't match the expense forecasts. It's off by about two percent, which doesn't sound like much until you multiply it across the entire project timeline."
She could feel him reading over her shoulder, his attention focused entirely on the numbers. She kept her voice steady, kept her tone professional, even though having him this close was doing something to her concentration that had nothing to do with the work and everything to do with the fact that she was acutely, intensely aware of every inch of space between them.
"You caught all of this in one afternoon," he said.
"I'm thorough."
She turned to look at him, and immediately regretted it because he was closer than she'd realized.
Close enough that she could see the exact shade of his eyes—dark brown, almost black in the afternoon light. Close enough that she could count the days of stubble on his jaw. Close enough that if she leaned forward even slightly, she could—
She didn't lean forward.
"Most people would have missed at least one of these," Dante continued, his gaze still on the file. "Probably two."
"Then most people aren't very good at their jobs," Mila repeated. She turned back to the file, needing the distance, needing to break the intensity of his attention. "Which, again, is why you didn't hire me to be most people."
He was quiet for a long moment. Long enough that she started to wonder if she'd said something wrong. Long enough that she could feel her heart rate picking up, that familiar spike of adrenaline that came from not knowing what someone was thinking.
Then he moved away, returning to his desk. The distance felt like relief and disappointment in equal measure.
"I honestly didn't have a lot of expectations when I offered you the job. But now I want you to compile a report," he announced, settling back into his chair. "All three discrepancies, with recommendations for how to address them. Send it to me by end of day."
Mila looked at the clock on the wall. It was three-fifteen. "End of day is five o'clock."
"I'm aware."
"That's less than two hours."
"Yes." He opened his laptop, his attention already shifting back to whatever was on his screen. "Can you do it?"
Mila looked at the files spread across her desk. The work was already done—she'd just need to organize it, write it up, make it presentable. Two hours was tight, but it was doable. It was also a test. Another one. To see if she'd panic or if she'd just get it done.
She gathered the files and started organizing them by priority. "I'll have it to you by four-thirty."
"Four-thirty?"
"You said end of day. I'm giving you a buffer." She didn't look up from the files. "You're welcome."
She could hear the smile in his voice when he spoke. "Noted."
Mila worked in focused silence, her fingers flying across the keyboard as she opened a new document and started typing. The report came together quickly—she'd already done the analysis, so it was just a matter of presenting it clearly, backing up her findings with the numbers, making recommendations that were practical and implementable. She wrote with the kind of precision that came from years of doing this, from knowing exactly what information mattered and what was just noise.
By four o'clock, she was done. She read through it once, caught a typo, fixed it, and read through it again. It was good. Professional. The kind of report that would impress people who knew what they were looking at.
She sent it to Dante's email and sat back in her chair, suddenly aware of how tired she was. The adrenaline was fading, leaving behind a bone-deep exhaustion that came from focusing intensely for hours. She'd done it though. She'd made it through her first day. She'd proven herself.
"Mila."
She looked up. Dante was watching her, his expression unreadable. He'd clearly read the report already—it had only been a few minutes, but he was the kind of person who read fast and absorbed information like a sponge.
"Yeah?"
"You're good at this."
It wasn't a question so much as it was a statement. A recognition. And it landed somewhere deep in her chest, in a place she didn't want to examine too closely.
"I know," she smiled slightly.
He held her gaze for a long moment, and she held his right back. There was something in his eyes—something that looked like respect, maybe. Or hunger. Or both. It was hard to tell with him. Hard to know where the line was between testing her and wanting her, between the power dynamic of the situation and whatever this was that was building between them in the quiet of his office.
"We should go," he said finally. "It's late."
Mila glanced at the clock and saw that it was 4:28pm. It wasn't late at all, but she wasn't about to complain. She was done, there was nothing left to do.
She gathered her things and stood, suddenly aware of how close he was again. How the space between them felt charged with possibility.
"Same time tomorrow?" she asked.
"Same time tomorrow," he confirmed.
But neither of them moved toward the door.