MY HUSBAND'S PERFECT ALIBI

THE INVESTOR

Ivy arrived before six, before the ovens were even fully warm, because a nine o'clock meeting didn't care what kind of week she'd had, and because the kitchen was still the only place that asked nothing of her except competence.

"You look terrible," Priya said, setting two coffees on the pass.

"Thank you."

"I meant it lovingly."

Priya slid her phone across the counter. "Also, look. Someone tagged us in that anniversary party post from the other night. It's getting real traction, might be worth putting on the website."

Ivy looked down at the photo, the woman in red holding up her ring hand, the venue tag beneath it, dozens of comments already stacking up. Free advertising, exactly the kind Priya would want to celebrate, with no way of knowing what the image actually cost the person standing across the counter from her.

"Good exposure," Ivy said, and pushed the phone back before she had to look at it any longer than that.

"Right? I was thinking, if the second location happens, we lean into stuff like this more.

Events, private dinners, the whole aspirational thing."

Priya nudged the reservation book toward her, entirely unaware of anything beneath the surface of what she'd just said.

"Micah confirmed for nine. Wants to walk through the Q3 numbers."

"I know." Ivy wrapped both hands around her coffee and let the warmth do something the drink itself couldn't.

He arrived at eight fifty-eight, two minutes early, which she'd learned was as close as he ever came to being late.

"Chef." Micah said it the way he always did, like a title she'd earned rather than a joke. He set his bag down and looked at her properly. "You didn't sleep."

"I slept some."

"That's not a real answer."

"It's the only one I've got today."

He didn't push, only opened his laptop on the counter between them. "The Q3 numbers are strong. Strong enough that I think we should talk seriously about the second location. Foot traffic on the east side has doubled since spring, and half of it's coming from that neighborhood near the Cole Enterprises tower."

Ivy's hand went still on her cup.

"That's a strange coincidence," she said carefully.

"It's not a coincidence. It's money, and money follows money."

Micah didn't notice her tighten, already scrolling to the next chart. "Half the executives up there haven't found a lunch spot worth the walk. If we opened two blocks over, we'd own that entire crowd inside a year."

Two blocks from Sebastian's office. Two blocks from every person who might, on any given day, walk past a window and recognize the face they'd only ever seen behind a mask.

"I've seen the numbers," Ivy said, which wasn't the objection she meant, but was the only one she trusted herself to say out loud.

"I know you have." He turned the screen toward her anyway. "I'm here because you'll say no to expanding for reasons that have nothing to do with the numbers, and I wanted to hear them before you..."

The front door chimed.

Ivy didn't usually flinch at the sound. The restaurant wasn't open for another hour, and Priya kept the front locked until service, but someone had clearly buzzed the intercom and let themselves in without waiting to be told it was fine.

"Sorry, sorry, I know you're not open," a voice called from the dining room. "I just need to grab the reservation book, Priya said I could pop by before..."

Ivy's whole body went cold before her mind caught up to why.

Owen.

Sebastian's best friend, in the flesh, walking toward the pass like he'd been here before, though never, in three years, on a day Ivy had been anywhere near the front of house.

"I didn't realize you knew the owner," Micah said mildly, watching Owen approach.

"I don't," Ivy said, too fast, and immediately wished she hadn't.

Owen stopped a few feet from the pass, close enough now that Ivy could see the exact moment his eyes moved from Micah, to the kitchen, to her.

She kept her head down, focused on nothing in particular on the counter, willing herself into the same invisibility that had saved her three nights ago.

It didn't work the same way in daylight, without a mask.

"Sorry to interrupt," Owen said, to Micah, not to her, thank god. "I'm meeting someone for a late breakfast. I think I left my reservation confirmation here last week."

"Priya can help you," Micah said. "She's just through there."

"Right. Thanks." Owen turned to go, then stopped, his eyes drifting back toward the kitchen, toward Ivy, and stayed there a beat longer than a stranger's glance should.

"Have we met?" he asked her directly.

Every part of Ivy wanted to look anywhere but at him. She made herself look up instead, because looking away would be its own kind of confession.

Behind him, Micah had gone quiet, watching the exchange without stepping into it.

"I don't think so," she said, pitching her voice slightly lower than her own, an old, reflexive trick from behind a mask that felt absurd without one.

"Huh." Owen tilted his head, studying her face like he was trying to place a word on the tip of his tongue. "You look really familiar."

He pulled out his phone.

Ivy's stomach lurched. She knew, with sudden and complete certainty, exactly what was sitting three taps away on that screen, the same photo Priya had shown her not twenty minutes ago, the same venue tag, the same crowd of faces in the background of a shot no one had thought to check before posting.

"I feel like I saw you at an event recently," Owen said, thumb already moving over the glass. "Give me a second, I think I've got a picture from...."

"Owen." Priya's voice cut through from the front, sharp enough to startle him.

"Reservation book's up here, and your breakfast guest just walked in."

He glanced up, hesitated, phone still in hand, then finally slid it back into his pocket, unopened.

"I'll figure it out eventually," he said, half to himself, and turned toward the front.

Ivy didn't breathe again until she heard the door chime a second time, signaling he'd gone.

Micah's laptop sat forgotten between them, the numbers on the screen entirely beside the point now.

"You want to tell me what that was?" he asked, quiet, not accusing, just present.

"It was nothing."

"Ivy."

He said her name the way he said most things, evenly, without pressure, but this time there was something underneath it, a question he clearly intended to keep asking until he got an answer that made sense.

"You went white the second he walked in. That wasn't nothing."

Her phone buzzed on the counter before she had to find an answer. She glanced down.

A text from Priya, sent from the front of house, close enough that Ivy could still see her through the pass.

*He just asked me your last name.*

The room tilted half an inch to the left, and Ivy had to set the phone down before her hand betrayed how badly it was shaking.