The man behind the large wooden desk sipped on his brandy. One day it would kill him and he knew it, but the surge of power he felt as the liquid transformed into fire inside his body was addictive. How could he let go now? How did he ever stand a chance against it?
The man's secretary was waiting for an answer. He scared her with his silence as he had always done, from the first day she had worked for him and every day since. Outside the office, she was a pretty confident woman, a wife who stood up to her husband and her two loud sons, a friend you could rely on for uncompromising honesty. But in here, power was not hers. It was sucked out of her violently as she stepped over the threshold. Her voice became a whisper and her wits deserted her.
As the man turned to her, she lowered her gaze. She would not want him to take her unflinching stare as a challenge. That would be most unwelcome. And very unprofessional.
The secretary had met his wife. She too was a creature of the dark. Pale as can be she was. And cold like the marble her expensive heels sharply clicked on. Their marriage had been a business deal like any other. The wife's family's company had been in serious financial trouble and she had been ready to sell herself to a loveless life in order to keep the legacy from drowning into irrelevance. And she did, without a moment's hesitation. Neither of them would ever dream of disgracing their arrangement with an affair. And yet, sometimes, the secretary could have sworn that there were suspicious noises coming from the great big cold office opposite hers.
"Do it", he said, his deep, self-assured, crude voice causing the little delicate hairs on the back of her neck to stand up straight in protest. She nodded, eyes held low.
"Do it", he repeated. The calm urgency in his voice was most unusual.
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