MY BROKEN RULE

CHAPTER SIX:WHAT VICTORIA SAID

I found out about the merger from Victoria, which should have told me everything about how much I could trust the information — and somehow didn't stop it from landing like a blow anyway.

"You didn't know?" She said it with just enough surprise to sound sincere, swirling her wine at the agency's launch mixer while I stood there trying to keep my face still. "The Adeyemi deal. It's not exactly a secret, Bella — Marcus has been planning it for a year. Julian's supposed to announce the engagement before the rebrand goes public." A small, almost sympathetic smile. "I just assumed, given how close you two have gotten, that he would've mentioned it."

He hadn't mentioned it. That was the part that sat wrong in my chest the rest of the night — not the merger itself, not even the idea of some Adeyemi daughter I'd never met, but the fact that a man who'd stood on an unfinished rooftop and told me he remembered me hadn't thought to mention he might be engaged within the month.

I didn't wait for him to explain. I've never been good at waiting for explanations — waiting is what my mother did, for years, while my father gave her reasons that were never quite reasons at all. So when Julian called that night, I let it go to voicemail. When he showed up at the office the next morning, I told him, evenly, professionally, that I thought it would be better if we kept things strictly business for the rest of the campaign.

"Bella." He said my name like it cost him something. "Whatever you heard—"

"I heard you have a wedding to plan," I said, and watched something in his face go still. "I don't do twice, Julian. I definitely don't do complicated. This was always going to end. I'm just ending it on my terms instead of waiting to find out yours."

I walked away before he could answer. It felt, at the time, exactly like winning. It took less than a week for it to start feeling like the opposite.

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