⋆. ̊| You won't take no for an answer (req)

── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──

Tim blinks once, slow, deliberate, then again, as if the second time might somehow reset reality into something more reasonable. It doesn’t. The sight of you striding confidently across the polished floors of Wayne Enterprises remains stubbornly, infuriatingly real. A quiet, controlled sigh escapes him, the kind he’s perfected over years of board meetings and public appearances. Of all the improbable, deeply inconvenient things that could have happened this quarter, your employment here ranks disturbingly high on the list.

You had, until very recently, been the single most persistent thorn in Tim’s side. The heir to a corporate empire that had rivaled Wayne Enterprises for years, you’d grown up draped in luxury and headlines, your last name synonymous with aggressive mergers and ruthless competition. Tim knew your father’s company inside and out, had spent countless late nights analyzing their strategies, countering their bids, staying three steps ahead. You, however, were a wildcard. Spoiled, by all accounts. Privileged. Someone who had never needed to work a day in your life.

And yet, here you were.

He’d first encountered you at a charity gala, one of those glittering affairs where billionaires pretended to be humble and competitors pretended to be friendly. Technically, he hadn’t run into you. You’d run into him. Literally. Champagne had sloshed, apologies had been breathless and suspiciously charming, and within minutes you’d been flirting with a boldness that bordered on reckless. Tim had assessed you the way he assessed everything: quickly, thoroughly. You didn’t seem cruel. You didn’t seem malicious. But you did seem used to getting whatever you wanted.

Unfortunately for you, Tim Drake was not a man with time to indulge whims, romantic or otherwise.

He’d declined politely. Calmly. Firmly.

Apparently, you’d taken that as a challenge.

Because mere days later, news broke that you’d secured a position at Wayne Enterprises. Not a partnership. Not a joint venture. A job. In his building. On his floor.

Tim hadn’t asked how you’d managed it. Bribery? Pulling strings? Leveraging some obscure clause in a contract? It didn’t matter. Whatever maneuver you’d executed, he refused to dignify it with curiosity. You were wasting your time if you thought proximity would change his mind.

And yet.

Here you were.

He spots you through the glass walls of his office, sauntering down the corridor with effortless confidence, a coffee cup balanced in your hand like an offering, or a taunt. Employees glance up as you pass. You don’t slow down. You don’t hesitate. You walk as though you belong here.

Tim straightens instantly, schooling his features into something neutral and executive. By the time you push open his office door without knocking, he’s leaning back against his desk, arms loosely crossed, expression carved from stone.

“What are you doing here?” he asks.

He intends for it to sound calm. Professional. Detached.

It comes out sharper than planned, a low, annoyed hiss barely disguised as civility.

His eyes flick downward, landing on the coffee in your hand. The faint curl of steam feels almost mocking.

“Seriously?” His brows knit together. “Don’t you have actual work to be doing?”

There’s a tightness in his jaw that betrays him, a flicker of something dangerously close to flustered beneath the irritation. Because despite everything, despite the rivalry, the persistence, the audacity, he knows one thing with absolute certainty:

You would not have gotten this far without meaning to.

And that, more than anything, unsettles him.