Chapter Nineteen: Breaking Point
729 Words
Chapter Nineteen: Breaking Point
Katherine
The email hit my inbox at 8:07 a.m.
Subject: Project Reassignment – Milan Account
From: Board Administration
My heart sank as I read it.
> Effective immediately, oversight of the Milan partnership will be transferred to Patrick Delaney, per board direction. Please forward all materials and client correspondence by end of day.
Patrick.
I stared at the screen, pulse pounding. I’d poured everything into that project — every idea, every late night. And now it was being taken from me like I was nothing more than a temporary placeholder.
I tried to breathe. Tried not to let the sting of it feel personal.
But when I opened the attached memo, my hands went cold.
It listed Andrew Austin as the one who’d “approved” the reassignment.
My vision blurred.
He’d promised to protect my work. To trust me. And now — this?
Before I could talk myself out of it, I was already walking down the hall, heels clicking like thunder on the marble floor.
His office door was open.
“Andrew,” I said sharply.
He looked up from his laptop. “Katherine—”
“Don’t,” I cut in. “You signed off on this?”
He frowned. “On what?”
I tossed the printed email onto his desk. “The Milan account. You let them hand it to Patrick like I was never part of it!”
He scanned the page, jaw tightening. “I didn’t approve this. The board moved it without my consent.”
“Then why does your name say approved?”
“Because that’s how they operate when they want something done fast.”
My chest burned. “You could have stopped it.”
“I tried!” he snapped, standing now. “I fought to keep you on it, Katherine, but they won’t listen. They think the situation between us—”
“Between us?” I said, voice rising. “There isn’t an us, remember? That’s what you wanted!”
The words echoed in the glass office.
He froze, the air between us sharp and heavy.
“I didn’t want this,” he said quietly.
“Then what did you want, Andrew?” My voice trembled, equal parts anger and ache. “Because from where I’m standing, it looks like I was just a convenient story to clean up.”
He looked like she’d slapped him. “You think that’s what this was?”
“I don’t know what to think anymore,” I whispered. “You say one thing, you do another. I can’t keep guessing where I stand.”
---
Andrew
He’d faced hostile boards, lawsuits, even press scandals. But nothing hit like hearing those words from her.
Katherine, the one person he never wanted to hurt.
“I never saw you as convenient,” he said, voice low, raw. “You are the reason that project succeeded. The reason this company still has heart.”
She shook her head, tears threatening. “Then why does it always feel like I’m the one who has to pay the price for being near you?”
The truth was, she was right.
He’d kept her close when it benefited him and pushed her away when it got too dangerous.
And now, he was losing her for both reasons.
He stepped closer, his tone breaking. “If I could trade places, I would. You deserve better than this — better than me.”
She met his eyes, hurt and fierce all at once. “Then let me be better without you.”
And with that, she turned and walked out.
The door closed behind her, and the room went silent.
For the first time in years, Andrew Austin didn’t feel like a CEO.
He felt like a man watching the best thing in his life slip away — and realizing it was his own fault.
---
Katherine
I didn’t cry until I reached the elevator.
It wasn’t just about the project. It was about everything — the confusion, the tension, the feelings I’d tried so hard to ignore.
As the doors closed, I caught one last glimpse of his reflection through the glass wall — standing alone in his office, still as stone.
And even through the anger, part of me still wanted him to follow.
He didn’t.
---
(End of Chapter Nineteen)
- Writer
