Taste of Obsession

The sound hit her first.

A low, guttural roar that vibrated through the soles of her shoes.

Then the dust.

A fine, grey powder that coated the pristine windows of Phoenix Rising and settled on the leaves of the potted ginkgo trees she'd babied for years.

Yu Zhen arrived at her restaurant at the crack of dawn, as she always did, expecting the familiar, comforting quiet of a kitchen before the storm.

Instead, she found a warzone.

A massive construction crew was swarming the building next door, the one Chao Wei Jun had so casually mentioned he'd bought.

Jackhammers tore into concrete.

Heavy machinery beeped and groaned.

And a huge, ugly, bright yellow crane blocked the narrow alleyway that served as her only delivery entrance.

Her produce truck was parked down the street, the driver gesturing frantically, unable to get through.

Oh, you have got to be kidding me.

This wasn't just construction.

This was a declaration.

A siege.

He was choking her supply lines.

He was laying waste to her doorstep.

He was doing it all with a smile, under the perfectly legal guise of "renovation."

The absolute, calculating, magnificent bastard.

"Mei Ling!" she yelled, her voice barely audible over the din.

Mei Ling appeared, wiping sleep from her eyes, a half-eaten bao in her hand.

She took one look at the scene, at the blocked truck, at the fury radiating from Yu Zhen in palpable waves, and her eyes widened.

"Holy shit," Mei Ling breathed. "He actually did it."

"He's not just doing it," Yu Zhen seethed, her hands clenched into fists. "He's enjoying it. This is a message."

"It's not a message, it's a goddamn billboard," Mei Ling said, taking a furious bite of her bao. "It says, 'I'm a rich asshole with too much time and money on my hands.'"

"No," Yu Zhen corrected, her eyes narrowing on the Chao Conglomerate logo already plastered on the construction barriers. "It says, 'I own you, and you don't even know it yet.'"

Okay, deep breaths, bestie.

Do not let him see you sweat.

Do not let him win.

But he was already winning.

He was disrupting her service before it even began.

He was costing her money.

He was reminding her, with every deafening roar of machinery, that he had the power to tear her world down without ever setting foot inside it.

She could call the city, file a complaint, get tied up in bureaucratic red tape for weeks while her restaurant slowly starved.

Or she could go to the source.

She could take the fight to him.

"Mei Ling, call the suppliers. Tell them to hold today's deliveries. Find a temporary storage solution. Do whatever you have to do," Yu Zhen commanded, her mind already shifting into battle mode.

"Where are you going?" Mei Ling asked, her eyes wide with alarm.

"I'm going to have a conversation with my new neighbor," Yu Zhen said, a dangerous calm settling over her.

She turned and strode away, not towards her kitchen, but towards the street, towards the heart of the city, towards the glass and steel tower where the devil himself probably worked.

The headquarters of the Chao Conglomerate was everything Phoenix Rising was not.

It wasn't warm or intimate or personal.

It was a monument to power.

A shard of gleaming, black glass that stabbed at the sky, so tall it seemed to bend the clouds around it.

The lobby was a cavern of white marble and cold, minimalist art.

The air smelled of money and ambition.

It was designed to make you feel small.

Insignificant.

It was working.

Yu Zhen walked up to the reception desk, a slab of marble so large it could have served as a banquet table.

The receptionist, a woman who looked more like a model, eyed Yu Zhen's simple trousers and silk blouse with a flicker of disdain.

"Can I help you?" she asked, her tone implying that she very much doubted it.

"I'm here to see Chao Wei Jun," Yu Zhen said, her voice steady.

The receptionist's perfectly plucked eyebrow rose.

"Do you have an appointment?"

"No."

"Mr. Chao does not take unscheduled meetings."

"He'll see me," Yu Zhen said, leaning forward slightly, her voice dropping to a low, intense pitch. "Tell him Lin Yu Zhen is here. Tell him it's about his... construction project."

The receptionist hesitated, clearly not used to being challenged.

She made a call, her voice a discreet murmur.

A moment later, she hung up, her expression unreadable.

"Mr. Chao's office is on the top floor. The private elevator is to your right."

Just like that?

He was expecting me.

The thought was both infuriating and oddly thrilling.

The elevator ride was silent and swift, a smooth, stomach-dropping ascent into the heavens.

When the doors opened, she wasn't in a reception area.

She was in his office.

The room was vast.

One entire wall was a floor-to-ceiling window offering a god's-eye view of Beijing, a sprawling, glittering tapestry laid out at his feet.

The other walls were bare, the furniture sparse and brutally elegant.

A massive desk, carved from a single piece of dark wood, sat in the center of the room like an altar.

And behind it, standing with his back to her, was Chao Wei Jun.

He was looking out at his kingdom.

He turned slowly as the elevator doors closed behind her, plunging the room into a thick, loaded silence.

He wasn't wearing a suit jacket.

Just a crisp white shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his forearms, revealing strong, masculine wrists and a watch that probably cost more than her car.

He looked less like a CEO and more like a predator in his natural habitat.

"Chef Lin," he said, his voice a low, amused rumble. "I had a feeling I'd be seeing you this morning."

"You're blocking my deliveries," she said, cutting straight to the point. No pleasantries. No games.

"Am I?" he asked, feigning innocence. He walked around his desk, his movements fluid and confident. "My apologies. The pains of progress, I'm afraid."

"This isn't progress," she shot back, taking a step forward, her anger a hot, living thing in her chest. "This is a power play. It's bullying."

"Business is about leverage, Chef," he said, stopping a few feet away from her. The space between them crackled with tension. "You have your principles. I have my... tools."

"You call a fifty-ton crane a 'tool'?"

"A very effective one, it seems. It got you here, didn't it?"

The audacity.

He wasn't even trying to hide it.

He was admitting, with that smug, infuriating half-smile on his face, that this was all a deliberate, calculated move to force her hand.

"You think you can just harass me into submission? Squeeze my restaurant until I have no choice but to sign your disgusting proposal?"

"I think," he said, taking another slow, deliberate step closer, "that you are a brilliant artist who is letting pride get in the way of a sound business decision. I am simply creating an environment where the logic of that decision becomes... clearer."

He was so close now she could smell his cologne.

Something clean and expensive, with an underlying note of spice that was dark and masculine and utterly distracting.

Okay, Yu Zhen, get it together.

He's just a man.

A stupidly attractive, infuriatingly confident, probably-great-in-bed man, but still.

Just a man.

"This is my life's work you're messing with," she said, her voice trembling slightly with rage. "This is everything to me."

"I know," he said, and his voice was suddenly softer, more serious. "That's what makes it so valuable. That's why I want it."

His eyes dropped from her face to her lips, just for a second.

But she saw it.

And her entire body went on high alert.

The air in the room grew thick, heavy with unspoken things.

The anger was still there, but now it was tangled up with something else.

Something confusing and dangerous.

An awareness of him not just as an adversary, but as a man.

A very, very attractive man who was looking at her like she was the most interesting thing in his entire, sky-high world.

I hate it here.

She had to change the dynamic.

She had to get out of this room.

"There is nothing to discuss," she said, forcing herself to take a step back, to reclaim some space. "Move your crane."

He watched her, his expression unreadable.

He knew he was winning.

He knew he had gotten under her skin.

But he also seemed to know that pushing her too hard right now would backfire.

He tilted his head, a thoughtful look on his face.

"You're right," he said, surprising her. "This is not the ideal venue for a proper negotiation."

He walked back to his desk, creating a distance that felt both like a relief and a disappointment.

"I have a proposal," he said. "A compromise."

"I'm not interested in your compromises."

"Hear me out," he said, his voice reasonable, persuasive. "My methods have been... aggressive. I can see how you might perceive them as hostile."

Perceive them? You parked a construction site on my doorstep!

"Let's clear the air," he continued. "Dinner. Tonight. At my home."

Yu Zhen stared at him, momentarily speechless.

Is he deadass right now?

"Absolutely not," she snapped.

"Why not?" he asked, a genuine curiosity in his tone. "Are you afraid to be alone with me, Chef?"

The challenge was clear.

He was calling her a coward.

And if there was one thing Lin Yu Zhen was not, it was a coward.

"I'm not afraid of you," she lied.

"Good," he said smoothly. "Then come to my penthouse. I'll cook. No assistants, no lawyers. Just you and me. We can talk, honestly, about what a partnership could look like. A real partnership. One that respects your art."

It's a trap.

Her mind was screaming it.

He's trying to get you on his territory, disarm you with his charm, seduce you into signing the deal.

It was the most obvious, transparently manipulative move in the book.

And yet...

She was tempted.

Not by him, she told herself.

But by the strategy.

To win a war, you had to understand your enemy.

She had seen him in her world.

She had seen him in his corporate fortress.

Now he was offering her a glimpse into his private life.

It was a risk.

A huge, stupid, potentially disastrous risk.

But standing here, in this office where he held all the power, she knew she had to do something to shift the balance.

"Fine," she heard herself say, the word tasting like surrender. "One dinner."

A slow, triumphant smile spread across his face.

It was the smile of a predator who had just watched its prey walk willingly into the cage.

"Excellent," he said. "My driver will pick you up at seven."

Walking out of the Chao Conglomerate building felt like surfacing for air after being held underwater for too long.

The city air, usually thick with smog, felt clean and fresh in comparison to the suffocating atmosphere of his office.

She had survived.

She had even won a small concession, a temporary truce.

But as she hailed a taxi, the adrenaline from the confrontation began to fade.

It was replaced by a cold, terrifying realization that settled deep in her gut.

She replayed the scene in her mind.

The way he moved.

The way he looked at her.

The unnerving calm he projected, a quiet, controlled power that was a thousand times more intimidating than shouting or threats.

He hadn't just angered her.

He hadn't just scared her.

Oh god.

Oh no.

She realized, with a sickening lurch in her stomach, that a small, treacherous part of her had been... excited by it.

Turned on by it.

She was attracted to his power.

Attracted to the very thing that threatened to destroy her.

The feeling was disgusting.

It was terrifying.

And it was, without a doubt, the most dangerous thing she had ever felt in her entire life.