Chapter Three

Sienna

If there was one thing I hated more than arrogant men, it was arrogant men who turned out to be right. I glared at the elevator doors as they slid open. "Morning, Ms. Brooks."

"Morning." The greeting came automatically, but my mood did not. I walked through BrooksWell's lobby with a coffee in one hand and enough irritation in the other to power the entire building.

Last week had been embarrassing. Not because Caiden Wyatt had corrected me, but because he'd corrected me in front of my board. I should have caught the licensing issue myself. That was the part that stung. Not his question or the silence that followed or even the way the board suddenly looked at him as if he'd hung the moon.

It was the tiny voice in the back of my head that whispered: He was right. I hated that voice. I buried it beneath work.

"Good morning!" A chorus of greetings followed me through the office. Developers waved from behind oversized monitors. Designers hurried past carrying mock-ups. Someone was arguing about fonts. Someone else was celebrating finally fixing a bug that had apparently haunted them for two weeks. This was my favorite sound. Not silence or applause. Chaos. Productive chaos.

Every person here had believed in BrooksWell before it became successful. I'd hired them, fought for them and promised them that this company would never become another corporate machine where people disappeared behind job titles. And now a lawyer was coming to evaluate everything we'd built. Wonderful.

Naomi appeared beside me with a tablet tucked under one arm. "He'll be here in ten."

"I know."

"You sound thrilled."

"I've had kidney stones that were more exciting."

She laughed. "I still think you're being dramatic."

"I'm not dramatic."

She looked at me. I looked back. "...Don't."

"You had a dream about arguing with him, didn't you?"

"I did not."

"You texted me at three in the morning."

"I..." She held up her phone. "'I just realized another reason he's annoying.'"

"...Delete that."

"No."

I sighed. "You're impossible."

"And yet somehow less impossible than Mr. Wyatt."

I shot her a look.

"Whose side are you on?"

"Yours." She smiled.

"I'm also on the side of common sense."

Before I could answer, the receptionist's voice echoed across the lobby. "Mr. Wyatt? Welcome to BrooksWell." Against my better judgment, I looked. There he was. Dark charcoal suit today. No briefcase. Just a leather messenger bag slung over one shoulder. His sleeves were rolled neatly to his forearms, as though he'd already decided this office wasn't worth pretending for.

He smiled at Mia, our receptionist. Not the polished smile he'd given the board last week. A real one. Warm enough that Mia immediately smiled back. Traitor.

"Thanks," he said.

"I hope I'm not early."

"Only by five minutes."

"My father always said being exactly on time meant you'd already wasted someone else's."

Mia laughed. I frowned. He wasn't supposed to be charming. He was supposed to be...lawyer-ish. Whatever that meant. He noticed me. Of course he did.

"Ms. Brooks."

"Mr. Wyatt."

"I appreciate you having me."

"I didn't have much choice."

His lips twitched. "Still." He walked toward us with the infuriating confidence of someone who'd never questioned whether he belonged somewhere.

"You've got a beautiful office."

"It's a workplace."

"It's both."

"No."

He glanced around the open floor. "Natural light. Open collaboration spaces. Quiet corners for focused work."

I blinked. "You noticed all that?"

"I notice everything."

That wasn't the reassuring statement he seemed to think it was. Naomi stepped forward. "I'm Naomi Chen."

"COO." Caiden shook her hand. "A pleasure."

"You remembered?"

"You introduced yourself last week." Naomi looked absurdly pleased. Another traitor.

"I'll leave you two to begin the tour." She disappeared before I could object. Coward. I started walking."I've allocated exactly two hours."

"I'll try not to exceed your generous hospitality." "You do that."

He fell into step beside me. Not ahead, but beside.

Why did that annoy me?

"This is Product Development."

Engineers looked up as we entered. Several greeted me.A few looked curiously at Caiden. I kept talking.

"We release updates every Thursday. Our legal reviews happen internally before deployment."

"How many attorneys?"

"Three."

He nodded thoughtfully. "And privacy compliance?"

"Weekly."

"International?"

"Monthly."

He didn't challenge a single answer. Instead, he simply listened. Which somehow irritated me even more. As we reached the next department, Ethan from engineering hurried over.

"Sienna, quick question."

I smiled. "What is it?"

"We're rewriting our user agreement for the new sleep tracker." He glanced at Caiden. "Oh...sorry."

"No," Caiden said."Go ahead."

Ethan scratched the back of his neck. "If a customer moves overseas after accepting our terms, do we rewrite the whole agreement?"

Before I could answer, Caiden spoke.

"No."

Ethan frowned. "Really?"

"You write one agreement with regional provisions."

His explanation lasted less than a minute. No legal jargon or showing off. Just clear.

Ethan's face lit up. "That actually makes sense."

"It usually helps when lawyers speak English."

A few people laughed. Even I nearly smiled. Nearly.

"Thanks," Ethan said. "That saves us a lot of work."

"Happy to help."

Happy. To help. I stared at him. Why? Why was he making this difficult? I'd already decided he was insufferable. Then he went and answered questions without making anyone feel stupid. As we left the department, I stopped walking."You didn't have to do that."

"Do what?"

"Help."

He looked genuinely confused. "He asked."

"You're here to evaluate us."

"I am."

"So why help us?"

He studied me for a long moment. Finally... "Because those aren't mutually exclusive."

I frowned. "They are where I come from."

"I noticed."

There it was again.That calm certainty. Not mocking or smug. Just... Observant. He tilted his head slightly.

"You expect every interaction to be a contest."

"And you don't?"

"No."

"You questioned me in front of my board."

"To protect your company."

"You embarrassed me."

"I challenged an idea."

"You challenged me."

He met my eyes. "I think that's the difference between us."

"What difference?"

"You hear criticism when someone offers another perspective."

The words landed harder than they should have.

I opened my mouth. Closed it again. He wasn't raising his voice. He wasn't trying to win. Which somehow made me want to prove him wrong even more.

"You don't know the first thing about me."

"No."

His gaze held mine. "But I intend to."

For one suspended heartbeat, neither of us moved. The office around us faded into a blur of conversations and ringing phones. His eyes searched mine, not with judgment this time, but curiosity. It was...disarming.

I looked away first.

"I still don't like you."

A faint smile touched his lips. "I didn't expect you to."

I hated that smile. Almost as much as I hated the tiny flutter in my stomach when I realized I was already looking forward to our next argument.

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