Chapter 231: The Secretary’s Surprise
Elias looked the executive assistant over from head to toe.
She was polished, poised, and pretty in the competent way Blackwood Group seemed to produce on purpose. Her suit fit perfectly. Her hair was swept back from her face. Nothing about her invited trouble, which naturally made Elias wonder what Serena would do if he caused some.
Would Serena lose her mind if he got involved with her assistant?
He did not know.
System Theta, however, panicked immediately.
[System Theta: Host, host, didn’t you say you only make moves on mission targets?]
The alarm in its voice was almost painful.
[System Theta: Why has the range suddenly expanded to every attractive woman you meet? That will multiply the difficulty of the mission!]
"I only thought it," Elias replied. "Relax. I want retirement more than anyone. I’m not going to wreck my own schedule over a passing impulse."
That settled System Theta only a little.
Elias was studying the assistant, but she was studying him too.
Her eyes rested on him for one brief second before she withdrew them with professional restraint. Then she offered a polite smile and gestured toward the seating area near the window.
"Please, have a seat."
Serena Blackwood had told her to take good care of him.
That alone made his presence unusual.
The assistant could not openly stare at a person Serena had personally left in her care. She understood discretion far too well for that. She had spent years at Blackwood Group learning what questions not to ask, which silences meant a document needed to disappear, and how to make a problem vanish from a calendar without making anyone feel dismissed.
Still, thoughts were not visible on anyone’s face.
After Elias sat on the low sofa, the assistant watched him glance around Serena’s office. He did not touch anything. He only looked, eyes moving across the room with the curiosity of someone who had never been given permission to occupy a space like this.
Who was he?
A relative?
That made little sense.
Serena had never filled Blackwood Group with family members. She was almost brutal about that. Every position had to be earned, every promotion justified, every executive forced to prove they could carry their own weight. It was one reason employees respected her. The other was that Serena treated people with a measured, deliberate courtesy. She could cut down an incompetent manager without raising her voice, but she never humiliated staff for entertainment.
So he was not family.
Then what was he?
A boyfriend?
The assistant dismissed the thought before it fully formed.
Serena did not have male friends, much less a public relationship. She had business partners, donors, attorneys, clients, investors, board members, and people who became careful whenever she entered a room. No one had ever heard a rumor about Serena Blackwood dating anyone.
Besides, the young man on the sofa looked too ordinary.
Clean, well-behaved, and harmless. The kind of college student who probably sat near the front of class, completed every assignment, and had no idea how to flirt with anyone. His glasses softened his features and made him look younger, almost studious.
Could someone like that really catch Serena’s attention?
The assistant kept the thought to herself.
"I’ll be right back," she said. "Please wait here."
She returned a few minutes later carrying a large tray of snacks from the executive kitchen.
Elias looked at it.
Then he looked at her.
Was she trying to entertain a child?
He rarely wasted energy being rude to people who had nothing to do with his mission. So he only let the corner of his mouth lift. The tips of his small canine teeth showed when he smiled.
"Thank you, ma’am," he said sweetly. "But I don’t really eat snacks."
The assistant felt her heart soften against her will.
That was unfair.
The boy had looked quiet before. Now he had called her ma’am with those bright eyes and that soft voice, and suddenly the possibility of Serena having a boyfriend did not seem entirely impossible.
He was sweet.
Too sweet.
The assistant caught herself before the thought drifted any further.
She also had the ridiculous impression that Serena dating someone this much younger would make people talk. Not because Serena lacked the status to do whatever she wanted. She absolutely did. Still, the age gap would look questionable from the outside.
Elias had already read enough from her face to know she was inventing an entire romantic history for him and Serena.
He felt briefly speechless.
Serena Blackwood had hired someone with this much imagination?
Then again, perhaps that was why they worked well together. People often gathered around those who resembled them more than they realized.
The assistant returned to herself and spoke more naturally this time.
"You don’t like sweets?"
Elias shook his head. "I just don’t like snacks much."
He was not a picky eater. He had no intention of limiting himself when every world he entered offered different food, different comforts, and different opportunities to survive in style.
The assistant smiled. "These aren’t the usual kind. Blackwood Group has them made for the executive floors. They aren’t sold outside the company. Employees can take them from the staff pantry, but they’re prepared through a private catering contract."
Elias’s eyes narrowed slightly.
"Really?"
"I wouldn’t lie to you."
The look he gave her made the assistant feel as if she were coaxing some innocent college boy into accepting candy from a stranger. The feeling lasted only a second before she pushed it aside.
Elias reached for one packet.
He opened it, dropped the snack into his mouth, and chewed.
Then his eyes brightened.
"It’s good."
The assistant smiled before she could stop herself.
Watching him smile made the office feel less sterile.
Once Elias knew the snacks were worth eating, he stopped pretending to be reserved. He reached for another, then another, working through the tray with impressive concentration.
[System Theta: You were right. You are absolutely being treated like a child.]
"I don’t care," Elias said. "This gives me another reason not to go down with Serena in some dramatic mutual-destruction ending. What a difficult life."
[System Theta: You just want more snacks.]
Elias ignored it.
By the time he finished, the whole tray was empty. The wrappers had accumulated around him, and crumbs dotted the sofa cushion and the hem of his clothes. He patted his stomach with quiet satisfaction.
Then he looked at the assistant with more approval than he had shown anyone since arriving.
"Thank you," he said sincerely. "They were really good."
The assistant’s smile widened.
"Would you like more? There’s plenty left. I can get another tray."
Elias hesitated.
Lunch would be soon.
But the snacks had been excellent.
After a brief struggle with himself, he nodded. "Please."
"It’s no trouble."
The assistant rose and walked toward the office door.
She had barely reached it when it opened from the other side.
Serena entered first.
The executive assistant froze.
Serena’s eyes went immediately to Elias.
Then to the wrappers.
Then to the crumbs scattered around the sofa.
Elias sat in the middle of it all with the last trace of snack powder still on his lips. What he had been doing was obvious.
Only after taking in the scene did Serena look at her assistant.
She did not say anything.
The silence was worse than a reprimand.
The assistant’s heartbeat picked up.
She had been having too much fun taking care of Elias. She had forgotten that Serena was obsessively neat. Not dramatically so, but enough that a crooked document stack would be straightened before anyone could finish apologizing. The sight of snack wrappers and crumbs spread across the chief executive’s private office could easily be taken as carelessness.
She had already begun wondering whether she would be scolded when Serena passed by her.
Serena walked directly to Elias.
The assistant turned around, worried despite herself.
What happened next made her eyes widen.
Serena stood in front of Elias and looked down at him. Then she lifted one hand and gently wiped the crumbs from the corner of his mouth.
Her tone carried mild reproach, but the affection in it was impossible to miss.
"How can you be this messy?"
Elias looked up at her.
His eyes were blank.
"I’m dirty," he said. "So what?"
The assistant’s face changed at once.
Serena ignoring the mess was shocking enough. Yet this young man had answered a gentle question with open hostility.
Serena’s expression darkened.
The assistant held her breath.
She had seen Serena’s face change like that before, always when something serious happened. A failed acquisition. A client who had crossed a line. A board member who thought money could protect her from consequences.
What would Serena do to him?
Serena looked at Elias for several seconds.
Then the tension left her face.
She reached down, took him by the hand, and pulled him up from the sofa.
"If you’re messy, you’re messy," she said. "Come on. We’re getting lunch."