All Chapters of Valerio's Secretary: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

46 Chapters

Chapter One: The Return

I grip the steering wheel so tight that it makes my knuckles ache. The city blurs past my window—steel towers and honking traffic that feels both familiar and wrong after three years. I should have turned around at the last exit.I almost did.But the envelope in my bag, the one with Liam’s latest daycare bill marked overdue in angry red wouldn’t let me. “You’ve got this,” I whisper to the empty car. The lie tasted bitter.My phone buzzes in the cupholder, and it’s a message from the nanny.Mrs. Rivera: Liam’s fine. He asked again about his daddy. I told him he works far. You okay?I don’t answer. I mean, what would I say? That I was driving straight back into the mouth of the man who had looked at me like a stranger three years ago? That our son—three years old with Valerios’s stubborn chin and my own dark eyes—is the only reason I was doing this at all?I pull up outside the modest brownstone where Mrs. Rivera lives before I head towards doom. Liam stands on the steps in his favorit

Chapter Two: The Rule

Zara’s POVI managed to make it to the ladies’ room on the executive floor before my legs gave out. I lock myself in the last stall, press my forehead against the cool metal door, and take in deep breaths. I’ve got this. I won’t falter.Welcome back.The bastard has no idea what those two words did to me.I straighten after a minute, check my reflection in the mirror; clear eyes, no tears. Good. I touch up my lipstick with a steady hand, even though my stomach twists in knots. This is what I came for. Answers and financial stability for Liam. Not whatever storm was brewing behind his eyes.When I step out, I see the same silver-haired man from earlier in his coat walking past the hallway. He’s fixed on his tablet, scrolling through something that makes his mouth tighten, while he passes by me. I catch his name embroidered on his coat: Dr. J. Arnolds, Corporate Health. I watch him disappear around the corner, wondering why a corporate physician is on the executive floor.Then a young

Chapter Three: The Obsession

Valerio’s POVI can’t get her out of my fucking head.Zara Matthews.Even her name feels like it belongs to my mouth. I stand at the window of my penthouse, whiskey in hand, staring at the city sprawled below me like scattered diamonds. The glass is cold against my palm, and my mind refuses to settle. Every time I close my eyes, I see her, poised in that black skirt, the way her fingers move across the keyboard like she’s done it a thousand times in that exact office. The way she looks at me, not nervous like the others, and not eager to please me.It pisses me off.I take another sip, letting the burn slide down my throat. The no-office-romance policy I’d put in place after the accidents was law, and I wasn’t going to break it myself. It’s there for clarity and control: something I really needed after I’d woken up from that coma with pieces of myself missing and the need to keep everything and everyone at arm's length.Especially women who made my blood run hot for no goddamn reason.

Chapter Four: The Cage

Zara’s POV My feet are killing me by the time the clock hit eight-thirty, but I keep typing. The Harrington proposal stares back at me from the screen, marked up with more red ink than black. Valerio had thrown three more files at me after lunch, each one more complex than the last. He was testing me, pushing, and waiting for me to crack. I won’t give him that satisfaction. The office has been quiet for some hours now. Most of the floor was dark except for the glow spilling out from Valerio’s glass office and the small lamp on my desk. I can feel him watching me through the transparent wall. Every time I glance up, his eyes are already on mine, intense and unsettled like I was a problem he needs to dissect. My phone lights up beside the keyboard. Mrs. Rivera again with updates on Liam. Mrs. Rivera: Liam is asleep now. He drew a picture of a big building and said it’s where you work. He wants to show you tomorrow. Guilt twists sharp in my chest, and I reply quickly. Me: Thank you

Chapter Five: The Touch

Zara’s POVThe apartment is quiet when I finally push the door open a little after ten. The living room lamp casts a soft yellow glow over the second-hand couch and the small pile of toy cars scattered across the rug. Mrs. Rivera looked up from her knitting, smiling that gentle, knowing smile she always gives me.“He fought sleep, but he’s out now,” she whispers, gathering her things. “Drew three more pictures of the big glass building. Kept saying ‘Mommy’s big important place.’”I nod, throat tight. “Thank you. Really. I’m sorry it’s so late.”She waves it off like she always does and slips out. I lock the door behind her, kick off my heels, and walk down the short hallway to Liam’s room.He’s curled up in his race-car bed, one small arm hugging his stuffed wolf. My heart squeezes so hard it hurts. He looks so much like Valerio when he sleeps—those dark lashes, the same stubborn set to his little mouth. I sit on the edge of the bed and brush a curl off his forehead.“I’m sorry, baby,

Chapter Six: The Voice

Valerio’s POV“Mommy? Who’s there?”The second I hear the small voice behind her, something in my chest twists hard.Mommy?Her face goes pale in the crack of the doorway, and her eyes widen. She glances back over her shoulder, and then at me again, like I was both salvation and disaster at the same time. “Give me one minute,” she whispers urgently. “Please.”She shuts the door in my face before I can even respond. The chain rattles, and I stand there in the dim hallway like an idiot, hands still in my pocket and heart hammering for reasons I don’t fully understand.I shouldn’t be here.I told myself that the entire drive over here. After she left the office, I sat at her desk again, breathing in the faint scent, then pulled her address from HR without hesitation, no second thoughts. Just this restless, gnawing need to see her outside the glass walls of my building. To figure out why she feels like a missing piece, I can’t name. Now, I’m standing outside her apartment at eleven at n

Chapter Seven: The Stairwell

ZaraI barely slept.Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Valerio standing in my hallway — tall, intense, and far too close to the truth. The way he looked at me when he asked about Liam’s father, the way his hand had brushed my hair, and the raw hunger in his voice when he said: “This isn’t over.”By six-thirty, I’m already up, making breakfast while Liam plays with his toy cars on the kitchen floor.“Mommy, is the tall man coming to our house again?” he asks innocently, pushing a red car across the table.My spoon freezes halfway to the cereal bowl. “No, baby. He was just… dropping off something for work.”Liam accepts the lie easily, but I feel sick doing this to him.I drop him off at Mrs. Rivera’s with a long hug and drive to the office with my stomach in knots. It’s just been a couple of days, and I’m already walking on thin ice. This isn’t how I imagined everything to play out. The executive floor is quiet when I arrive, and I settle at my desk, going through his emails, trying

Chapter Eight: The Late Hour

Zara“I should get back to my desk,” I say, trying to step around him.His hands come out, not grabbing my arm but brushing lightly against my waist as I move past. The touch is accidental, barely a touch, but it burns through my blouse like fire. I freeze for a second, and he does too. “Sorry,” he mutters, though he doesn’t sound sorry at all.I make it back to my desk on shaky legs, but Valerio stays in his office, and I leave the door wide open, following his instructions. For the next few hours, I feel his eyes on me constantly. Every time I look up, he’s watching.At 9:40 p.m., my email pings.From: Valerio Cruz Subject: Deadline Change The Harrington proposal needs to be completely reworked. New version on my desk by 7 a.m. tomorrow. Include updated market analysis and risk assessment for the European division. Don’t leave until it’s done.I stare at the screen and feel like screaming my head off. This is impossible. The original file is already thick, and reworking it from

Chapter Nine: The Space Between

Zara's POVThe next day also blurs into another test of endurance. Valerio changes deadlines again at midnight, another impossible rework, and another late night that stretches into early hours. I know what he’s doing; he’s pushing me, and watching how I’ll break, and every single time I deliver, the hunger in his eyes grows darker. By eleven-thirty, the office is once again empty, except for us. I sit at my desk, neck aching, fingers flying across the keyboard as I update the latest financial projections he demanded. My eyes burn, but I refuse to let him see me weak. His door is wide open. He hasn’t spoken much since I arrived, but I feel him constantly. At 12:17 a.m., he walks out carrying two coffees again and sets one beside me without asking. “Grazie,” I murmur without thinking, the Italian slipping out from old habit.Valerio pauses mid-step. His eyes sharpen on me. “You speak Italian?”I curse myself internally. “A little. Picked it up somewhere.”“Your accent is terrible,

Chapter Ten: The Descent

Zara's POV The elevator doors just start to close when a large hand shoots between them, forcing them back open. Valerio steps inside. My stomach drops. After everything that has happened tonight—the massage, the almost kiss, the way his fingers had lingered on my collar like he had every right to touch me—I’m not ready for more. Not tonight, not when my body is still humming from his closeness and my mind is screaming at me to keep my walls up. He doesn’t say anything, just presses the button for the underground parking garage, and stands beside me, close enough that our arms brush. There's plenty of space, but he makes it feel tiny. His presence feels every inch of space, sucking the air out until all I can hear is the low hum of the machinery and the sound of my own heartbeat. The doors close, and we start descending, neither of us speaking. I keep my eyes fixed on the glowing floor numbers, eager for them to drop faster. Twenty-three…twenty-two…But he shifts slightly, and

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