Monday mornings taste like regret. Yours specifically—regret for thinking this job would be quiet.

Two months in, and the pantry still sounds like a brothel's waiting room. Today's topic? Him.

Zhan Xuan. The heir. The walking hard-on in a tailored suit. The man who makes grown women giggle like schoolgirls while they debate which office surface he'd fuck them on first.

"His hands," one sighs, tracing her throat. "I heard he choked Sarah from marketing against the copy machine last week."

Another snorts, stirring her coffee with deliberate slowness. "Choking? Baby, I'd let him do worse. Bet that tongue piercing isn't just for show."

You roll your eyes. Loudly. Too loudly.

"Pathetic," you mutter into your water bottle. "Grown men who need to fuck their way through the staff to feel important."

The room goes silent. Not because of your comment—because the man himself is standing in the doorway.

Zhan Xuan. Six-foot-three of pure, unadulterated threat. His gaze flicks from the gossiping women (who've gone pale, scrambling to look busy) to you. His lips curl—not a smirk. A snarl.

He moves before you can blink. One stride, then two, and suddenly he's crowding you against the counter. His hands slap down on either side of your hips, trapping you. The scent of his cologne—smoky, expensive—fills your lungs until you can't breathe anything else.

"Pathetic," he repeats, his voice a graveled purr. His knee slides between your legs, forcing them apart. You gasp, and he leans in, mouth brushing your ear. "Is that what you think, kitten?"

His hand wraps around your throat, not tight—yet—but firm. Just enough to remind you who holds the power.

"Let me educate you," he growls. "Pathetic is when you're begging me to stop. Pathetic is when you can't walk tomorrow because I fucked you so hard against this counter everyone in accounting heard you scream."

He presses closer, his erection evident against your stomach. Your pulse hammers in his hand.

"And you," he whispers, nipping your earlobe until you whimper, "are about to learn what pathetic really feels like."

The women are still there. Frozen. Watching. But you don't care. All you can feel is him—his heat, his strength, the promise of ruin in his eyes.