Chapter Text
Kylo Ren was an intense man, with dark eyes and even darker hair. And a wicked mouth, and gorgeous dark beauty marks, and enough confidence to run a publishing company. Rey knew he was all of those things, but she also knew he was a cunning asshole who would do and say anything to ensure his success. She knew he was slimier these days. And why fantasize about an old friend, when you know he is a terrible person. Rey flicked her eyes up through her glasses to take a peek at the man as he briskly walked by, gracefully holding his black coffee in one hand and his briefcase in the other, down towards his office at the end of the hall. Rey hoped to look up just long enough as to not make eye contact –she doesn’t want to start anything this early– but sure enough his eyes meet hers and his lips curl into a sneer as he looks away. She scoffs and spins herself back to the computer screen to deal with her emails. Sometimes Rey can’t believe his arrogance.
They haven’t been able to be polite to each other in a very long time. Once upon a time they were almost chummy– back when Hux was still with the company. Back when they would all go out for dinner together and didn’t have to worry about their images so much. Now everything is different. Now Kylo runs this company, and Hux somehow got wrapped up in a major tech conglomerate that wants to buy them out, and sell books through the internet exclusively. Super weird stuff. When Hux was still at the Resistance we would all go out for drinks, and sometimes her and Kylo would lean in close and whisper while tipsy. While it never led to anything serious, it had always driven her mad, acting all soft with him, and then going back to work and just acting like it hadn’t happened. Over time, he got so wrapped up in work he wouldn’t even acknowledge her anymore. He wouldn’t acknowledge anyone actually. No one could ever get him to grab lunch, because he would just work through it, or start seeing clients every lunch. He moved up so quickly in the company, it was unprecedented.
Ever since Hux sold out and left, Kylo has been working extra hard. Rey thinks he’s trying to ensure the Resistance doesn’t get bought out by the First Order now that they have someone with insider knowledge. However, seeing all this work Kylo does makes Rey mad. Kylo Ren always has a way of making her feel incompetent. In the early years when they were both newbies, he would chat with her over coffee in the breakroom and he would give her tips sometimes, and other days she would give him tips. Then after a couple days on call with clients he would say her advice really helped and give examples. They used to have real conversations. And now… well they just snap at each other every chance they get.
Rey is still stuck in a cubicle, even after all these years. But she thinks she is close to getting the small office once Owen retires. He's been mentioning that she would make a good HR Director every now and then, and she hopes it means she will become the director. She does have a minor in Anthropology afterall, which would do well in an HR position. Rey lets out a sigh, which snags the attention of Finn from the cubicle across from her, who’s walking in now with two cups of coffee in hand. Rey chuckles,
“You’re almost late, bucko” and Finn grins.
“I was getting afraid I would have to live this day without you,” Rey puts a hand over her forehead with dramatic flair.
“Good thing I brought you this elixir to help with your woes,” Finn says with a Shakespearean tilt to his voice. God, this is what happens when liberal arts majors grow up. They get real jobs and fail to be normal on the daily. Finn laughs a little to himself,
“Damn, do you hear us? I’m afraid they’ll fire us for that publicity failure,” Finn speaks in a hushed tone while he hands Rey her drink and she takes a whiff through the little hole. Oooh.
“Is it the new pistachio latte?”
“You bet it is. One for each of us, tis the season,” Finn smiles again. Rey always appreciated what an infectious smile he has. Finn joined the team as an intern right before Kylo got promoted, and then he got promoted to marketer like her. They became fast friends. Both are grown up foster kids. So they both understand how unfair things can be, and both have accepted it. This understanding and some mimosa filled brunches have made them close friends. They also both majored in English in New England schools— so they get the vibe basically. The kids who were obsessed with Harry Potter and classical literature from too young of an age.
As the two of them are talking about the nights they had before (Finn and his boyfriend Poe went out and watched the new Spider Verse movie, both seemed to really enjoy it). And Rey informed him of her Thai takeout and Doctor Who marathon (lonely people things). Rose trots over in cute ballet flats to remind them of the meeting with Mr. Ren, that's scheduled to be 30 minutes from now.
“Thanks, Rose,” Rey says with a small smile, and Rose matches it.
“Of course!” She scurries back over to her desk. She seems like a sweet girl. She started as Ben’s secretary a couple of weeks ago, so she’s still pretty new to the game. Kylo has yet to make outrageous demands out of her (ordering coffee from the town over is too extreme). She beats his last secretary though— Bazine was a piece of work. She was always throwing herself onto Kylo, and it got to the point he had to fire her. Just, how can someone be so bad at respecting boundaries? Regardless, it seems like Rose may be a good fit.
The meeting rolled around quick as ever, Rey feeling like she never has enough time to prepare for Ben’s unending questions. The man tends to sound droning, drilling everyone over the same stuff every week. Upon sitting down in the meeting she makes direct eye contact with Kylo Ren from across the room. He is always perched up in the conference room waiting for us. Usually he has his laptop with him, but today he’s glancing through manuscripts of potential sellers. His head snaps up to glare at her and she's taking it with an iron will, holding his gaze, waiting for him to challenge her. He gives up and looks away and immediately demands Phasma for her numbers in the accounting department. He goes through and questions everyone, and once it's Rey’s turn he makes eye contact again and asks his menial questions.
“Miss Palpatine, did you finish editing the second half of Boys in a Small World?” Her eyes widened. She wasn’t aware that it was supposed to be done today. Like a wolf he sniffs her fear out. She decides to just face it.
“No, sir. I was under the impression it was to be done by Friday,” she counts the days on her hands dramatically,
“So, three more days, no?” She loves to piss him off.
“Well I want it done by tonight, I need to close this deal,” He bristles, and she watches his jaw tighten. He stacks his manuscripts together like he’s done with the meeting and hands his papers to Rose.
“What if it can’t be done by tonight?” Rey challenges him, and Rey doesn’t miss how everyone's eyes are glued on them. Poor Rose looks stricken to her post, inexperienced with their outbursts. Kylo turns to her and she relishes seeing the molten in his eyes. Oh he's so mad. Kylo stands on his damned tall legs just to sneer down his nose at her.
“It will be done tonight. Paper copy turned in to my desk, by 6 o’ clock,” He turns heel and exits the conference room, not giving her any more room to argue. Rey watches his fine ass strut off and rolls her eyes.
Finn turns toward her with wide eyes,“Are you going to be okay, peanut?” He looks so concerned.
She can feel their peers' eyes on her too. Rey shrugs.
“I have practically all day to finish it, no biggie,”
“Yes, and then you have to meet with him personally to turn it in??” He nearly yelps out of fear.
“Oh come on, Finn. He’s not that scary you don’t need to worry,” She waves her hand like his wrath is nothing, and Finn stands with his mouth agape.
“Babe, he’s terrifying, respectfully,” The two of them start gathering their stuff and exit the meeting, “Like, one time Rey, I forgot to press send on an edit and I kid you not, he was sitting in my chair at my desk the very next morning! Demanding I give him an explanation!” He throws his hands in the air, fed up just thinking about the memory. Rey can’t help but laugh for her friend.
“I’m sorry, Finn, that's awful, but also extremely hilarious,” she giggles while finishing up her sentence. Finn scoffs before matching her smile.
“But, him sitting at my desk would be miles better than him ignoring me,” Rey frowns, mind quickly drifting to all the reasons she holds onto him.
“Oh, is that what this is about?” Finn sticks his tongue out at her conspiratorially, “Your unrequited love for the big boss?” he whispers while giving her arm a small punch. She groans and punches him back, “Maybe! Keep your voice down!” and he rolls his eyes,
“Rey, the tension between the two of you is palpable at times,” he gives her knowing eyes, and she playfully smacks his arm.
“Kylo has nothing to do with that, it's my pent up frustrations causing all that,” she sighs, fully aware of what she's so frustrated with, and fully aware of what's pent up.
Finn shrugs, “Maybe it's him that's pent up,” and Rey jovially laughs again.
“Regardless of what's going on in his pants, I’ll have it done by tonight if it's the last thing I do,” she confirms confidently, prepared for all the work she's resigning herself to this afternoon. Finn gives her a couple pats on the back and a “Good luck, kiddo,” that don't sound too reassuring.
Rey compliantly sat at her desk and worked her ass off all day. She gave herself a quick Goldfish break, but after that she got back at it. She wanted it complete before six, and she wanted it to be perfect. She wanted Kylo, Mr. Ren to be blown away by her work. So blown away that he bends her over his desk and gets to work on their family of five… However, Kylo Ren was never amazed by anyone's work. Mildly pleased with it? Yeah that's the best most could hope for from their cold-hearted boss.
This book he is having her edit in particular is for the children's department, wherein a lot of their sales come from. It's about three boys from dramatically different home environments somehow coming together and bonding over speed racing on the backroads of the small country town they live in. It's one of those kids books where one is surprised by how sad it gets. One of the boys even dies in the end of leukemia, and the other two have to deal with the aftermath. She just hopes it's a top seller and not another book underlooked by internet-hooked tweens. They could all benefit from the sales…
Rey slams her freshly empty Red Bull onto her desk and crushes it triumphantly. It was done. With 30 minutes to spare, so take that Kylo. The realization that she's finished finally triggers her impending sense of doom. Oh lord, Rey has to confront Kylo in 30 minutes. It hadn’t truly hit all day, because all she could think about was the task at hand. Now however? Her mind knows limits, running from sexual fantasies to fear of him firing her. If he tried to fire her, she'd take his ass to court so hard on some female discrimination shit, he wouldn’t even know what hit him. Asshole that Kylo may be, she feels like hating women is beneath him. He's just the sort of person who’s rude to everyone, it would be impossible to determine if it's sexist. Morally, Rey thinks he respects women. He never saw a problem with giving Phasma a raise. Rey prays he selected her because he can just see men and women as equals, and not to meet some gender quotas.
Rey glances at the window of his office at the end of the hall, and her heart rate quickens. She wipes her sweaty palms on her skirt and sends her files over to the printer, needing to use this time to give his Highness a paper copy. Dick move, making her waste all this paper.
“Finn! I’ve finished,” she whisper-yells over their cubicle barrier and he throws a fist into the air and mouths a ‘whoop’, making sure the client on the other end of his call doesn’t hear him.
She struts over to the copy room in her heels and stockings, not afraid to add a little flair to her step. Rey knew she was a gorgeous young woman, and why not flaunt it while you still got it? She could feel her hips lightly strain against her pin-stripe grey skirt, and didn't miss the stares the nerdy dudes in IT gave her. She just flips her hair while walking past, trying to look unbothered by their creepiness. The printing takes forever considering it’s thousands of words, and hundreds of pages.
The process takes up all of her left over time, and soon enough it’s time to be reckoned by Kylo himself. Rey gathers all of her papers and works them into a binder, hoping this is presentable enough. She gathers the rest of her hope and makes her way towards that damned door at the end of the hall. Each step feels like a wish towards death, and yet each foot keeps stepping in front of the other. She takes a deep breath once she reaches his door and tries to delude herself with confidence before she grabs the handle and pulls.
As soon as the door opens her eyes meet the scene. Kylo is sitting calmly at his desk with a manuscript flipped open and a red Sharpie clutched in his right hand. His eyes are looking at her sternly, disapprovingly.
“What makes you think you shouldn’t knock?” his voice inquires, breaking the silence.
“Well, sir, we had a scheduled appointment,” She flips her hair while she strides into his office.
“I figured that meant you were expecting me, no knocking necessary,” she gives him a sweet smile, knowing the real reason has something to do with a perfect excuse to piss him off. He frowns deeply as his eyes roam over her.
“In the future, knock,” his eyes lock onto the binder in her hands. “Is that it, Miss Palpatine? Finished copy, that should be free of errors and typos?” He questions her integrity while holding his hand out for her lazily. Rey grits her teeth, “Error free, sir” she insists angrily while clutching her work. His eyebrows lift at her statement, as if he's in disbelief.
“I don’t believe you Miss Palpatine, hand it over,” his palm widens ready for her binder and she begrudgingly passes it across the wooden desk. Immediately he shoves his other books to the side and furiously opens her work. His eyes are racing through, seeking her mistakes. He feels typos like the way a wizard feels magic. It's practically an innate skill of his. Rey is just standing in front of his desk watching him analyze her words. His damned skill quickly spotted something amiss. She watches his twisted grin unfold as he uncaps his pen and marks a big red circle in the middle of the page. No doubt about it, Kylo had found a spelling mistake. He turned the page around the desk to face the standing Rey and she looked down at the desk to see the word trapped by his red pen. His wide unhinged smile is looking down at her, waiting for her to read her fuck-up.
‘The setting sun set Romeo’s hair ablaze as he skated down the trak,'
The mistake was literally so simple, her finger just forgot to press down on the C key, and everything in her being just wishes she had pressed it. She’s cursing herself for not catching it earlier, embarrassed he found something so soon. What other mistakes will this man find?
“Get closer to the desk, Rey, bend over and get a good look at this error,” His voice is restrained and deep, begging her to obey. So she takes two steps forward and lowers her back until it's flat and her ass is daring to peek out of her skirt. If he's trying to humiliate her she won't make it easy for his cock.
trak
The stupid typo is staring into her soul, just trying to remind her that she’s a fucking loser. A loser who can’t even write properly. She shakes her head ashamed. Something this small should be avoided.
“I’ll write it again, Mr. Ren,” She reaches out to grab the binder and he swats her hand away. She can’t help but feel a tingle in her hand regardless.
“No need, I’ll finish the editing myself Miss Palpatine” the hair on her skin rises. She’s both scared and utterly excited. He’s taken the work off her shoulders, but at what cost? Her mouth tries to blabber something, yet no noise comes out.
“Stop looking like a fish, Rey, straighten up and go home,” She straightens to a standing position and flattens out her skirt, hoping he’ll say one more thing to her desperate self.
“Meet me here tomorrow morning before work starts. We’ll finish going over your mistakes,” His hand flips a page over and she watches as he circles yet another word. Her stomach flutters before dropping. Oh lord.
“Yes sir,” She whispers and proceeds to walk out.
“Goodbye Reyna,” he whispers lowly to her back, and she almost didn’t catch it.