Married By Mistake

Chapter Twenty-Four: Ten Weeks

Elena's POV

He called at seven in the morning, which told me before he said a word that something had shifted overnight.

"There's a documentary," Jax said, no hello. "About prodigies. Mine's one of the stories they keep circling back to. It's already in production. Ten weeks out."

I sat up in bed, phone pressed hard to my ear, feeling the floor of the last two weeks tilt yet again.

"Ten weeks," I repeated.

"Yeah. A guy who judged that night in Vienna reached out. Says he's been trying to get them to let me have a say in how it's told before they just use whatever footage exists." His voice had none of its usual deflection in it. Just tired. "There's footage, Elena. I didn't even know that."

"Are you okay?"

"I don't know yet. Ask me again later."

I let that sit for a second, not pushing, the way I'd learned not to push with him.

"What do you want to do," I asked.

"I don't know that either. But I know Regina's deadline just got a lot more complicated. If a documentary's already circling my name, her whole plan to use me as some kind of feature attraction at Amanda's wedding might not even be hers to control anymore."

He was right, and the professional part of my brain, the part that never fully shuts off no matter what else is happening, immediately started running the new math.

"I need to think about how this changes things with her," I said. "And I need to call Priya, get ahead of anything that might already be moving."

"Yeah. I figured you would."

There was something in his voice, a small, tired resignation, like he'd expected me to pivot straight into problem-solving mode the second he told me. It stung a little, hearing it land that way, even though I understood exactly why he heard it that way.

"Jax, I'm not trying to manage you right now. I'm trying to help."

"I know. It's fine. Old habit, probably mine, expecting people to only care about the parts of me that are useful to fix." A pause. "I'll call you later. I need to figure some things out on my own first."

He hung up before I could argue, and I sat there in my quiet bedroom holding a phone that had gone silent twice in two days at exactly the moment I wanted to keep talking.

My own phone buzzed again ten minutes later, and for one hopeful second I thought it might be him again.

It wasn't.

Unknown number: Hi Elena, this is Marisol Chen with the Metro Weekly. I'm working on a piece about your engagement and a recent development involving a second marriage. I'd love to get a comment from you directly before we run anything. Happy to talk whenever works.

I stared at the screen, feeling something cold settle into my chest that had nothing to do with the morning air.

A journalist. Not a gossip account run anonymously behind a stock photo avatar. An actual byline, an actual publication, the kind that got picked up by other outlets and stayed searchable for years.

I called Priya immediately.

"Metro Weekly," I said, the second she picked up. "A reporter just texted me directly, asking for comment on the marriage."

"How did she even get your number?"

"I don't know. I don't want to know." I was already pacing my bedroom, the way I pace when a vendor cancels three hours before a wedding, except this time there was no backup vendor to call. "This isn't a gossip account anymore, Priya. This is an actual paper. If they run something, it's not going away in a week."

"Okay. Okay, don't respond yet. Let me loop in the PR consultant we used during the Kensington thing. We need a statement, something controlled, before you say a single word to her directly."

"I don't even know what the statement would say. I don't know what's true enough to say and private enough to protect."

"We'll figure it out. But Elena, you need to call Jax. If this reporter has your number, she might already be looking for his."

My stomach dropped at that, thinking of him alone in his apartment, still raw from the documentary news, about to get blindsided by a second, faster threat before he'd had a chance to process the first one.

I hung up with Priya and called him immediately. It rang four times before going to voicemail.

I tried again. Same result.

I sent a text instead, hands moving fast, trying to outrun a clock I could feel closing in from every direction at once.

Me: A reporter from an actual paper just contacted me directly. She might try to reach you too. Please call me back the second you see this. I don't want you finding out about this from a stranger.

I stared at the screen, willing the three dots to appear.

They didn't.