MY EX RETURED AS A BILLIONAIRE

Chapter two

Chapter Two

Sophie's POV

I didn't remember the walk from Ryan's office to my new desk.

One moment I was standing in front of him, and the next, Olivia was showing me where I'd be sitting — a small workstation just outside a glass-walled office two doors down from his.

"You'll mostly be supporting the marketing team," Olivia said, "but some days you'll be pulled in for executive-level projects. Mr. Black likes hands-on people."

I nodded, only half listening. My mind was still stuck on two words.

Welcome back.

I sat down at my new desk and stared at the blank monitor in front of me, willing myself to focus. New job. New life. I'd promised myself that this morning, and I wasn't going to let one confusing sentence unravel three years of moving forward.

Except my hands were still shaking.

By lunch, I'd managed to convince myself I'd imagined the whole thing — that grief and shock had made me hear something that wasn't really there. Maybe "welcome back" just meant welcome to the company. People said things like that all the time.

I almost believed it.

Then Olivia dropped a folder on my desk. "Mr. Black wants this on his desk by three. He's picky about mistakes, so double-check the numbers."

"Got it."

She lingered a moment, glancing toward his office before lowering her voice. "Can I say something?"

"Sure."

"Be careful with him."

I blinked. "What do you mean?"

Olivia hesitated, like she was deciding how much to say. "He doesn't usually react to anyone. Ever. I've worked here two years and I've never seen him look at a new hire the way he looked at you this morning."

My stomach tightened. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Maybe not." She gave me a small, unreadable smile. "Just — be careful."

She walked away before I could ask what that meant.

I delivered the folder at exactly 2:52 PM, mostly because I didn't trust myself to be a second late and give him any reason to look at me like that again.

His office door was open. He was on the phone, back to me, one hand braced against the window like the city outside owed him something.

"—no, I don't care what the board thinks. We're not selling." A pause. "I said no, Marcus." He hung up without saying goodbye.

I cleared my throat. "Your report, Mr. Black."

He turned. For half a second, something flickered across his face — there and gone so fast I almost doubted I'd seen it.

"Leave it on the desk."

I did. My eyes caught on something as I set the folder down — a framed photo, face-down, tucked half-behind his monitor like someone had tried to hide it and only half-succeeded.

I shouldn't have looked. I looked anyway.

The edge of the frame was visible enough that I recognized it. A cheap wooden frame. The kind you'd buy at a drugstore, not the kind a billionaire's office should have.

My chest ached before my brain caught up with why.

I gave him that frame.

Our second anniversary. A photo of us at the lake, laughing at something I couldn't remember anymore.

"Something wrong?" His voice was sharp, and I realized I'd been staring.

"No." I stepped back too quickly. "Nothing."

He watched me a beat too long. Like he knew exactly what I'd seen and was daring me to say something about it.

I didn't.

I turned and left, my heart pounding the entire walk back to my desk.

He still had it. Three years, and he still had that photo, close enough to touch, hidden but not thrown away.

That wasn't what people did with things that meant nothing to them.

That evening, Daniel picked me up from work, his usual easy smile waiting behind the wheel.

"How was the first day?" he asked, pulling into traffic.

"Fine," I said automatically. "Long."

"Yeah?" He glanced at me. "You seem off."

"Just tired." I looked out the window, watching Brightstone's glass tower shrink in the side mirror. "New job jitters, I guess."

He reached over and squeezed my hand. "You'll be great. You always are."

I smiled and let him believe it.

I didn't tell him about the office. About the voice behind the door. About the photo.

I didn't tell him that the man I used to love, the one who vanished without a word three years ago, was now signing my paychecks.

And I definitely didn't tell him about the strange, cold way Ryan had said welcome back — like I was the one who owed him an explanation, and not the other way around.

Daniel's phone buzzed in the cupholder. He glanced at it, and for just a moment, that same flicker crossed his face that I'd seen this morning — tension, quickly smoothed over.

"Everything okay?" I asked.

"Fine." He didn't look at the screen again. "Work stuff."

I let it go.

I had enough ghosts of my own to chase today.