"You've got more piercings, boss?" Jane entered the house without knocking, handing out cookies to the four large dogs surrounding her.
"Not good?" Alexandra asked, barely looking up from her laptop, where a spreadsheet full of player retention metrics glowed on the screen.
"Dreaming again?" Jane plopped down on the plush sofa, Luna the Akita immediately pressing herself into her lap. "I need you to sign the latest contract. We've got the deals for Ellevest and Walnut."
"Oh, the top ten startups," Alexandra said, brushing her hair back. "Not bad."
"Yeah, and we've got some really good sales this time," Jane replied, scratching Luna behind the ears. "Between our own game revenue and the outsourcing work, the studio's in solid growth mode. You know how Ashes After Midnight is making a billion a year? We're not there yet, but Blackfile: The Veiled City is building traction fast. And the service contracts, design, multiplayer coding, and asset work—they're pulling in steady clients. The industry growth curve is exactly like you predicted."
Alexandra leaned back, a faint smile tugging at her lips. She'd built Dreambyte Games to run almost entirely remotely, controlling production from her home while the team operated across different countries.
The model worked, publishing their own games for long-term revenue and offering development services to other studios for immediate cash flow. Networking, portfolio showcases, and the occasional high-profile deal kept new projects coming in.
She'd hired Jane not just for her skill but for her ability to keep the paperwork and the people away from Alexandra's peace. $300,000 a year, with the understanding that Jane handled everything without disturbing her too much. A $175,000 bonus if she managed to increase sales per year.
Jane grinned, her pen poised over the sleek tablet in her hand. "So, what's next? More investors or more players?"
Alexandra reached for the contract resting on the coffee table, her fingers brushing over the crisp paper. "Both," she said simply.
She leaned back against the sofa, stretching one arm along the cushions. "Please arrange a Zoom meeting with the teams from Hong Kong and Seoul tomorrow. Just follow their schedule, around 10:00 a.m. UTC+9."
"Noted, boss." Jane tapped the screen, logging the meeting into her calendar.
Her gaze lingered on the woman across from her, the effortlessly elegant thirty-three-year-old woman who had been her boss for nearly a decade. Alexandra had once even bought her a spacious apartment in New York, freeing her from the burden of rent. It was just one of many gestures that hinted at the loyalty and care Alexandra inspired in those who worked with her.
To the outside world, Alexandra Whitmore doesn't look like the owner of a thriving game development studio. Strangers would never guess she could code complex systems, design immersive worlds, and unravel a cybercrime network in the time it took most people to make coffee. The police had called on her expertise more than once, seeking her insight into hacking and online crime cases, requests she usually accepted with reluctance.
People imagined someone entirely different when they saw her in person: a glamorous model in Los Angeles, sailing on a gleaming yacht with runway models, sipping champagne in the arms of handsome men, and dancing in private clubs until the first blush of dawn. That's the Alexandra they pictured, because she looked more like a hot model than a hot nerd.
The truth was far quieter and far more unusual. She lived in a log cabin by a wide, slow river in the foothills of Vermont, sharing the space with four massive, affectionate dogs.
Her evenings were spent not in velvet-lit lounges but in the warm glow of her kitchen, baking cakes or simmering stews, then sitting by the riverbank to enjoy them in the hush of nature.
"Hotel bill?" Jane lifted an eyebrow at the stack of envelopes, all marked urgent, all from luxury hotels and seaside resorts.
"As usual. And add the dog sitter's bill, plus the housecleaner's." Alexandra didn't look up as she signed another document.
Jane stood, gathering the necessary paperwork. She knew the truth behind those bills. Her boss was never indulged in the arms of a handsome man, but in the arms of a beautiful woman, a woman who would be gone before morning.
Alexandra's romances never lasted. She never brought anyone home. Everything stayed only in short trips, weekend getaways, and expensive staycations. Jane had learned the pattern over the years: when Alexandra's sleep was disturbed, she cut ties without warning. No calls, no goodbyes. Then she buried herself in work, pouring every ounce of focus, every fragment of herself, into the studio until there was nothing left to feel.
The truth ran deeper than anyone else knew. Since she was thirteen, Alexandra had been haunted by the same dream, vivid, impossible, and painfully real. A woman she had never met, yet knew as intimately as her own heartbeat.
She remembered everything: the warmth of her skin, the curve of her smile, the soft, coaxing tone of her voice, and even the faint trace of a sweet perfume that clung to her like a memory you couldn't wash away.
And always, it was the same woman. The same lips. The same hands. The same look in her eyes, a love so deep it felt eternal. In recent years, a name had finally surfaced from the haze: Selena.
"There are a hundred and ninety-five countries on Earth," Alexandra had once muttered in frustration. "How many women are named Selena? And I have to find the right one?" Each time the dream returned, it left her shaken, pulling her further from reality. How could she fall in love with someone in the real world when her heart already belonged to someone in her sleep?
At twenty-two, she had started seeing a psychiatrist. Sedatives became part of her routine whenever the dreams flared up. Dr. Kate Haywood called it a fear of commitment, her subconscious sabotaging serious relationships by throwing her into this emotional whirlwind. Alexandra called it nonsense, but she kept quiet. She needed the prescriptions, after all.
The dreams were growing stronger with age, more vivid, almost urgent, as though the woman was trying to break through from somewhere else. Alexandra had even entertained the idea of past lives or alternate universes. "Is that even possible?" she'd whispered once, to no one in particular.
Snapping herself out of the thought, she glanced at Jane. "I'm going out tonight. Watching the kids."
"Coming back tomorrow?" Jane asked carefully. Alexandra's late-night excursions rarely ended with her in good shape.
"Hopefully." Alexandra disappeared into her bedroom and reemerged a few minutes later wearing a black, knee-length spaghetti strap dress and knee-high boots. Her hair framed her face in effortless waves. Red lipstick replaced her usual neutral shade. Glasses off, contacts in, and the transformation was complete.
Jane let out a low whistle. "Damn, I almost fell for you, boss." For a straight woman, she hated to admit how dangerously attractive Alexandra could be.
Alexandra smirked. "Oh, darling, you couldn't handle me for the next twenty-four hours." She brushed her lips against Jane's, then crouched to kiss each of her four massive dogs.
Jane rolled her eyes. She was used to these sudden bursts of affection, though they never failed to unnerve her. Alexandra Whitmore in work mode is sharp, calculated, and relentless. Off the clock, she is something else entirely—wild, impulsive, and impossible to predict.
"You really should stop kissing me like that," Jane said, gathering her things.
"I'll kiss whoever I want." Alexandra's tone was light, almost teasing, before she slipped out the front door. Moments later, the growl of her truck's engine echoed into the Vermont night.
Jane sighed, pulling up the contact for the dog sitter she'd already booked for the next two days. Even if Alexandra made it home on schedule, she wouldn't be herself for at least three more days.
Alexandra didn't have the strength to face the city tonight. She was already standing at the edge of her sanity, teetering on thoughts she could barely contain. The dream had been too real, so real she woke with Selena's name spilling from her lips.
"Oh, Selena… Selena… what the hell am I supposed to do with you? I don't even know if you're real… Jesus Christ."
Her truck rolled into the gravel parking lot of The Barrel Nightclub. Even from outside, the throb of bass rattled her bones. A few women at the entrance recognized her instantly—nods, sly smiles, and the kind of silent acknowledgment that carried history.
The first floor swallowed her in a wash of pounding music and heat. Colored lights carved jagged streaks across the dance floor. Someone slipped a hand around her waist before she could order a drink, a woman with black eyeliner smudged perfectly along her lashes, offering a small white bag in one manicured hand.
"Not now, sweetheart," Alexandra murmured, voice low.
The woman only grinned and pulled her toward the center of the floor. Bodies pressed close, the rhythm consuming them. Alexandra moved without thought, her mind a storm of tequila and defiance. She wanted to forget Selena, even if it meant destroying herself in the process.
Shots kept coming, one after another, each burning trail down her throat blurring her edges further. Two beautiful women pressed in on either side, their hips grinding to the bass, their perfume wrapping around her. Lips found hers. Red lipstick smeared. Hands roamed freely. For a while, she let the music be her only language.
By one in the morning, Alexandra staggered out into the cool night air with two women tangled around her arms. The nearest hotel is the Bridge Ridge Inn, and by the time they stumbled into the room, the white powder had made its second appearance.
No words. She inhaled. The rush is immediate, her world tilting into a bright, sensuous haze. The music from the club still pounded in her head, but softer now, as though it came from another life. Everything shimmered. Every face in front of her blurred into her. Selena. Two of them, smiling, touching her, pulling her under.
The white powder slid into her veins like liquid silk, blending with the tequila already flooding her system. Time slowed. Touch became electric. Every brush of skin against hers is amplified, making her crave more, a desperate hunger that had nothing to do with love and everything to do with forgetting.
Alexandra surrendered to the haze, to the fleeting ecstasy that promised escape, knowing it would vanish by morning and leave her emptier than before. But, at least this night she can feel that Selena is real.