Chapter 7

"You are a cop," You stare into the mirror, pep-talking yourself as much as you could before you could walk into face Eisuke again. "You have infiltrated a drug cartel. You looked pimps in the eye and managed to come out alive. You are a strong woman. Eisuke Ichinomiya cannot intimidate the likes of you." You constantly repeated, as if it were a mantra.

"You-"

The door to your bedroom flew open, Eisuke looked extremely annoyed. "You're late."

"I-" You looked at him, wide-eyed, previous thoughts out of the window. You were already dressed, uniform and stockings on. You checked your watch, "Mr. Ichinomiya, it's 7 o'clock in the morning."

"You are to be awake when I'm awake," He said, pointing carelessly at your hair. "Tie that up."

"I-" Before you could even answer, he walked away.

"Damn," You said, quickly tying up your hair and storming out after him. Somehow, he wasn't even visible in the hall. You literally ran after him, silently making your way into his penthouse. How did he even get access into your bedroom?

He was sitting at the table, taking a bite out of a piece of dried toast. You began making him his daily coffee, just as he liked it, pouring it into an empty cup before handing it to him. You began to adjust everything else, attempting to listen to his conversation. Was he on a Bluetooth? Who was he talking to?

You cleaned up the table after him, watching him with intense eyes.

"I don't care what he thinks, we've already talked about it with the shareholders." Eisuke snapped, and you realized that he was indeed on a Bluetooth. "I don't think he has a choice. Send him off with a nice severance package and call it a day."

Can you send me off with a nice severance package? You murmured to yourself, stepping away from the kitchen so you could clean the offices. You began rummaging through his things, attempting to have some organization in this pigsty. You knew that Eisuke often had maids to deal with his mess, which is probably why he left all of his things in disarray. Honestly. There was no point into looking into it further, you were positive that Eisuke was smart enough not to leave his shady auction stuff lying around. However, Soryu Oh intrigued you, especially with his dealings with the mafia.

"You!" Eisuke said, and you felt your heart jump out of your chest as you saw him standing on the threshold. "What on earth are you doing?"

"Cleaning your office, sir."

"Did I ask you to do so?"

You were taken aback by his question. "I'm your maid, of course. I thought…"

"These are confidential files." Eisuke said, walking towards you and pinning you against the table. However, you knew that he wasn't doing it to intimidate you on purpose, he was legitimately worried.

"Sorry, sir." You said, and his eyes evaluated you, to see if you were telling the truth. You were a good liar- it was legitimately your profession. That seemed to be a sufficient explanation for him.

"That's fine. I'm just on edge," he said, moving away from you and you let out a huff of relief. "The merger of Clifford Hotel is not going as smoothly as I thought it would be." You had no idea why he decided to vent to you, but you could tell he was getting increasingly frustrated.

"I don't know why you even bother to acquire them, anyways."

Eisuke snorted, as if he expected that answer. "Financial advisors for the Ichinomiya group. It's better to take out your competition in order to monopolize the industry."

You rolled your eyes at his reasoning. You weren't a CEO of a hotshot company, and maybe you were just a mere commoner, but you were interested in business as well, and you very well knew why he was trying to acquire Clifford Hotel. "I know that, sir. I'm just surprised that your financial advisors told you to acquire a business which is known to cook their books."

You wished that you could shut your mouth in that instant- the FBI had been investigating Clifford Hotel for faking their accounts and revenue, but it was a building case. There was no way that any of Eisuke's advisors could possibly know that.

His eyes widened. "Where on earth did you learn that?"

You coughed, before looking up at him defiantly. "Ever read the news or look at their numbers online?" You knew that that wasn't his job-it was usually the accountants, but you liked being patronizing towards him. "Their numbers in terms of growth... their operations in China... It seems a bit suspicious, no?"

He looked at you before turning around and walking away. You childishly stuck your tongue out at his receding back before continuing on to look at his files.

You spent the rest of the morning silently cleaning the penthouse in your utter boredom. Despite the fact that you were taking care of, perhaps, the most intimidating member of the Ichinomiya Group, it was rather boring.

At lunchtime, you were helping the chef pick out Eisuke's lunch. You had immediately become well acquainted with him, a Japanese man who learned how to cook in Paris. His English was near perfect, and probably one of the reasons why he had such a coverted job.

You picked out a nice salmon dish, hoping that you wouldn't have to talk to Eisuke at all in the evening. Your hopes were vanquished when, at noon exactly, he walked up to the dining table and plopped himself in the chair. He looked completely exhausted.

You served him his lunch quietly, placing it in front of him. You hadn't eaten since last night, and since the chef had taken a liking to you, he had promise to save you a sandwich for lunch. You were pumped to eat it.

"Sit," Eisuke said, his arms crossed and his eyes fixated on you.

"Sir?" You asked in confusion, yet terribly annoyed.

"You were right about the merger." He said, spearing his food with his chopsticks angrily. "I took a closer look at the numbers, along with their executive team. I cannot believe that my own accountants thought this was a good business decision. It is the very last time I leave my business in the prying hands of the shareholders."

You laughed awkwardly, still standing. "Well, I guess it's better than making a mistake."

"From the looks of it, the property is most likely to be seized by the government," He said, eating his food casually, as if you were a co worker rather than his maid. "It will be sold to the highest bidder. It was the right choice to drop the merger for now. I also need to sell out of the company..." He began murmuring to himself before realizing that you were standing. "I said, sit."

You resigned to sit despite the fact that you felt increasingly snippy towards him.

"I am rather impressed with your knowledge." He said, taking a sip of water. "I did not expect to be saved by a common looking maid like yourself." You resigned yourself to hold your tongue.

"I didn't expect someone as powerful and smart as you to be so lax in his duties," You snapped back, even though you should have really held your tongue.

He didn't seem to be pissed at you, however, no matter how many times you violated his rules. He most likely did not expect for you to be as snarky as you were, but you didn't care. Let him fire you, it would be a waste for him seeing that you knew what you knew.

"I have to admit that I have made an error in my reasoning. I will most likely have to push back my plans for a few weeks, if not months in order to deal with the aftermath of this mess."

"It's a lesson well learned." You murmured.

He looked at you. "I suppose that means you are getting the hang of your job."

"Yes, it does."

"Does that mean you are ready to take on more responsibility?" He asked, a glint of something in his dark brown eyes. "I hope the money I paid for you was worth it."

"You can buy someone at the next auction, then." You said, trying to keep the sarcasm out of your voice.

He snorted. "I doubt it. I am most likely forced to push back the auction for a few weeks because of this administrative mess-" fuck, fuck, fuck, you thought to yourself, "And you and I will be accosted with meeting for the other merger coming up soon."

You wanted to punch yourself in the face. Never have you ever managed to self-sabotage yourself this badly. You just had to open your stupid mouth and let Eisuke know that the company that he was acquiring was already tainted with criminal investigations. Not only did you save him from an embarrassment, but as a result of that, he was going to push the auction back to two Sundays from now.

"I trust that Kenzaki has trained you when you had first arrived. He had nothing but good things to say about you, and I am planning to find out whether he is truthful or not."

You snapped back to reality, ignoring the urge to shoot yourself in the face. "Of course, Mr. Ichinomiya." You stood up and bowed your head to him. "I will be the perfect little worker." Heat seeped towards your fingertips as you realized that you would most likely be forced to work to the bone without any significant rewards or information from Ichinomiya.

"I wouldn't expect anything less."

Author's Note: Hey guys, I want to thank you for reviewing and reading. I had been writing this story for fun, and published it for fun. To be honest, I had a lot more written, but completely forgot about updating. This story is was originally just a passion project- a way for me to dump my thoughts after playing the game. However, because of your encouraging reviews, it has fueled me to keep on going. In fact, there will be more adult themes (I don't know if I should change the rating later), but I wanted to keep a tone consistent of the premise of the actual game. In the game- you are sold at a black market auction- it is pretty dark and interesting premise. That isn't to say that it will be all doom and gloom-there will be heartbreak and death, but there will be happiness as well. Additionally, I am in University at the moment- I hope I will be able to write as much as possible for you, but I am extremely busy. I hope you continue to read, follow, favourite and review, especially. It's the one thing that keeps me hammering at the keyboard.

Anyways, about this chapter- a little bit filler-ish, I suppose. It's to establish the relationship between Eisuke and the Reader a bit more. Their relationship is quite a slow burn. The next chapter I have written has a bit of a time skip, but the conversations within it is one of my favourites. I think you guys will be very happy with it, which is why I'm currently editing Chapter 8 to death. I cannot wait for you to read it and tell me what you think. Cheers!