Fattening My Bosses Daughter

Chapter 1

Drew sat in the glass conference room with his jaw clenched so tight it hurt. His boss, Miranda stood at the head of the table in one of her razor cut blazers, voice dripping with honeyed poison.
“This,” she said, tapping a manicured nail against the slides Drew had spent the last week perfecting, “is exactly what not to do. Sloppy. Amateur. Honestly, I’m embarrassed you thought this was ready for anyone’s eyes but your own.”
A few of the other employees shifted uncomfortably, eyes dropping to their notepads. Nobody ever defended him. Nobody ever defended anyone. Miranda was untouchable, and she reveled in it.
Drew swallowed the anger rising in his throat. He wanted to fire back, to call her out for the fraud she was, but he could already picture her sly smile twisting tighter, the way she’d turn it back on him. He’d seen her do it a hundred times.
“Sorry, Miranda,” he muttered instead, fists curled under the table.
“Good.” She smiled sweetly, as though she’d just done him a favor. “Learn from this.”
The meeting dragged on, but Drew didn’t hear a word. By the time it ended, his blood was boiling, his humiliation complete. He gathered his things with mechanical precision and walked out of the office, ignoring the pitying glance from one of the interns.
The evening air hit him like a splash of water, cool, sharp, alive. He kept walking, not caring where his feet took him, weaving through the city streets until the office towers gave way to little shops and cafés strung with lights. His mind churned with curses, with fantasies of quitting, of telling Miranda exactly what he thought of her plastic empire.
He stopped when the smell of coffee and fresh bread drifted toward him. A café on the corner, cozy and glowing with warm light. For a moment he thought about just walking past, but something pulled him in.
That’s when he saw her. Sitting at a patio table, legs curled under her chair, a novel open in front of her. She had the kind of beauty that didn’t need makeup or posing. A softness around the eyes, a natural curve to her smile. She looked up at him, and he froze.
“You look like you’ve had the worst day,” she said, voice light, teasing, but kind. Drew laughed before he could stop himself, bitter but real. “That obvious?”
She closed her book, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “Come on. Sit. Sometimes coffee helps more than sulking on the sidewalk.”
For reasons he didn’t understand, Drew sat. Maybe it was the warmth in her voice, maybe the way she looked at him like she genuinely cared. For the first time all day, the knot in his chest loosened.
“I’m Sophia,” she said, extending a hand across the table.
The name hit him like a sucker punch. Sophia. Miranda’s daughter. He recognized it instantly. The stories, the occasional photo on Miranda’s desk- her prized model, the jewel of her brand.
Drew felt the air leave his lungs. He should have stood up. He should have left. But instead, he found himself shaking her hand, the corners of his mouth curving into a smile he hadn’t felt in months.
“Drew,” he said softly. Her smile deepened, unaware of the storm she had just walked him into.