His office takes my breath away—panoramic windows look over Nightshade City’s expansive skyline. On one wall is a mahogany desk with a sleek computer setup, while another showcases various awards and pictures of Zayn shaking hands with official looking people. His scent permeates everything, claiming this space as his own. Despite the grandeur, it feels impersonal and cold—like him when he isn’t around me.
“So… what do you want me to do?” I asked tentatively as he settles behind his desk, shuffling through papers.
“Make yourself comfortable,” he motions to the lounge. I sit heavily on it. For some reason, I was expecting it to be somecozy little building, not an actual skyscraper. However, I am now left twiddling my thumbs as he logs into his computer.
“Sitting on your lounge and watching you is not what I had in mind for work.”
Zayn sighs heavily. “Considering I wasn’t planning on coming in here today for now, it will do; just give me a second, and I will give you something to do.”
I mosey around the room looking at all the pictures, ones with his family and him as a child to him graduating from university to a picture of him and… me? My heart stops.
“What?” I find myself picking up a photo of me.
“This was at the pack meeting when I met you.” he states, coming up behind me.
“What are you doing with it?” I demand.
“I took it while I was sitting across from you.” He smirks before returning to his desk.
“That’s creepy!” I huff as I put it back on his desk. “So, what do you want me to do, Alpha Zayn?” I ask sarcastically as he glares at me for using his title like that.
“My files are right there. Sort them by date, will you?” he points to a mountain of files at the end of the desk.
“Are you serious?” I ask incredulously. He simply raises an eyebrow at me, waiting for an answer. With a huff, I grab the first pile and sit on the lounge, dumping them on the small coffee table that is vacant in his office. The next few hours pass by boringly slowly as I look through papers after papers on mergers, takeovers, shares, and deals. I don’t understand it all, however I date them. I did manage to do just fine until lunchtime comes around.
“Hungry?” he asks, not looking up from his computer screen. I stand, my back stiff and sore from sitting in one position for so long, before grabbing the next pile of files.
“Starving,” I tell him.
“Let me finish these emails, and we’ll go get something.”
I nod, taking the last few documents back to the coffee table. Then I notice my mother’s name. “What’s this?” I ask him. He glances at me before standing and shutting down his computer. He comes over to me while I try to decipher what it is; it looks like land title transfers, but that isn’t my mother’s signature, that much I do remember. I used to be jealous of her handwriting.
“Zayn?” I ask, holding up the documents before noticing the one behind it. I see the official title changeover for my father and Linda.
“Show me,” Zayn tells me, and I hold out the paper to him, his eyes narrowing before he snatches it off me.
“Were you going through my drawers?” he accuses, shocking me. I stare at him.
“What? No, it was in the pile. What is that?” I ask, reaching for the paperwork, but he pulls it away. “And why do you have it?” I demand. Zayn grits his teeth when I reach for it again, and I snatch it from his grip.
“I’ve been looking into the rogue attack. That is the land transfer from when your mother handed the pack over to your father and Linda.”
“That’s not my mother’s signature,” I tell him.
“I know. Alpha Greyson had some documents of hers, and we compared them.”
“Do you recognize the handwriting?” he asks, and I shake my head.
“No, it’s not Linda’s or my father’s,” I tell him. The signature looks like it was done by someone else; the pen used seemingly different despite the color being the same, like it was filled out with a ballpoint pen and the signature was done in some sort of marker pen.
“That’s not the same pen used up here,” I tell him, pointing to the signature. Zayn also nods. “Why do you have this?”
“I started looking into your mother’s death after I met you. The council approved a transfer a couple of days before the rogue attack. I tried to get the footage from the council for that day, but we are having trouble locating it because I know that isn’t your mother’s signature; she would have had to sign that at the council with a witness. Unfortunately, the witness is dead.” Zayn tells me. Now I see the witness’s name, gasp.
“Your father…” Zayn nods.
I shake my head. “This doesn’t make any sense.”
