CHAPTER 1; BEFORE THE GALA
“Are you going to drink that or just stare at it?”
Ethan’s voice floated in from the other room—smooth, tired, already halfway somewhere else.
Alaina blinked at the cold coffee in her hand. “It’s fine,” she said. “Just… letting it cool.”
“It’s been an hour.”
He laughed, and she forced herself to smile.
He walked past her, phone pressed to his ear. Shareholders… sponsors… press schedule… the same words that had replaced good morning months ago.
She whispered to herself, “He’s just busy.”
She’d said it so many times it almost sounded true.
Later, he came out in a fresh shirt, cologne sharp enough to sting.
“You packed the files?”
“Yes.”
“And the cufflinks?”
“They’re in the drawer.”
He nodded without looking up, then paused behind her. His hand touched her waist—lightly, as if confirming she was still there.
For a second, her body remembered him.
When he kissed her, it was careful. Measured. Like something practiced for cameras.
She leaned into it anyway, eyes closed. Maybe this time he means it.
His breath brushed her ear. “You’re distracted.”
“So are you.”
He smiled, a flash of teeth, no warmth. “You should rest. Big night in two days.”
“Big night,” she echoed. The words tasted bitter.
When he moved closer again, she let him.
He wanted her—at least the part of her that still looked good in his arms.
And she wanted to believe that wanting was love.
Afterward, he left without another word.
The door clicked shut, clean and final.
She sat on the edge of the bed, fingers tracing the rumpled sheet.
It felt like touching the remains of something sacred.
The next morning he was gone before sunrise.
“Investors’ lunch,” the note said.
Short. No heart, no promise, not even his usual E.
By afternoon she was in the car, following him without quite knowing why.
The city glowed with pre-gala polish, banners and lights and the illusion of celebration.
“Turn left,” she told the driver.
“Ma’am, that’s not—”
“Just do it.”
They stopped near the river district. His car was already there.
Glass buildings, quiet street, the kind of silence that hides secrets.
She walked closer, heels echoing against pavement.
Through the first-floor window she saw him—suit jacket off, sleeves rolled, laughter soft.
And her.
The woman everyone whispered about.
The one with the perfect hair, the easy confidence, the kind of beauty that doesn’t apologize.
They kissed.
Not the polite kind. Not the staged kind.
Real.
The light was on. The curtain half-drawn.
She could see the curve of his hand on the other woman’s back. The tilt of her head.
It was almost gentle.
Her fingers curled against the window frame.
“He doesn’t even turn off the lights,” she whispered.
Her voice cracked. “He doesn’t even hide it.”
A man passed on the sidewalk, glancing at her. She turned away, pulled her coat tighter.
In the car, the driver looked at her through the mirror. “Home, ma’am?”
She nodded, eyes fixed on nothing. “Home,” she said, and almost laughed.
Because what was that place now?
A house with no laughter. A bed that still smelled like him but felt like loss.
She stared out the window the entire drive back.
Rain had started—soft, uncertain, like it wasn’t sure it should fall yet.
Inside her, something finally had.
That night, she didn’t sleep.
She lay awake listening to the city’s hum and the rain growing heavier.
Once, she reached out to the space beside her, where he used to sleep.
Cold.
She whispered, “Maybe love just forgets people.”
Then quieter, “Maybe it forgot me first.”
The rain answered for her, steady and unkind.
