WHERE THE RIVALRY ENDS

The Shattered Contract

The door had barely clicked shut behind Levi when it burst open again, the echo of its impact rattling through the office. Thalassa exploded into the room, her heels striking the floor like gunshots, her hair immaculate, her lipstick perfect, her whole presence radiating outrage. It was obvious she’d been waiting just outside, listening for her cue, ready to make her entrance the moment the coast was clear. She’d heard enough.

“A Rossman, Jayce?” Her voice was sharp, slicing through the air with all the subtlety of shattered glass. “You’re throwing away our engagement, throwing away the merger our fathers have built, with three years of negotiations and carefully signed contracts, for a pregnant waitress in a thrift-store jacket?”

I shrank back instinctively, clutching my battered bag to my chest as if it could shield me. At that moment, I felt transparent, a ghost watching my own fate debated by people who barely remembered I existed. My hands trembled, my heart pounded too loudly in my ears.

Jayce, on the other hand, didn’t so much as flinch. He moved away from me, his stride slow and deliberate, crossing to his desk with the kind of poise that could pass for indifference, but I saw the tension in his jaw, the way his hands curled into fists before he forced them to relax. The warmth he’d shown me before had vanished, replaced by a steely chill. The man I thought I knew was gone, replaced by someone who looked like he’d been preparing for this battle all his life.

“She’s not a waitress, Thalassa. And you’d better watch your mouth.” Jayce’s voice was low, each word sending out ripples of warning.

Thalassa’s lips twisted into a sneer. She turned her gaze on me, her eyes raking over every flaw with practiced cruelty. “Oh, excuse me,” she said, her words dripping with contempt. “Is she the love of your life after one night playing in poverty? Or is she just the excuse you needed to finally defy your father? Don’t kid yourself, Jayce, you don’t love her. You barely know her.”

He didn’t bother denying it. “It doesn’t matter,” Jayce replied. He braced himself against the desk, locking eyes with Thalassa, refusing to yield an inch. “Things have changed. There’s a child. A Colt heir.”

“An heir?” Thalassa barked out a laugh, brittle and ugly. “Don’t make me laugh. That’s not an heir. That’s a scandal. My father will pull every cent of the Combs investment before sunrise. Your father is throwing away everything for spite, and you’re just standing there, wagging your tail, letting him pull your strings.”

Jayce’s eyes flashed. “My father is protecting what’s his,” he shot back. “And right now, that means Veda.”

Thalassa stalked closer, her steps predatory, her diamond ring catching the light and scattering it across the room like a thousand tiny knives. “And me? What about everything I’ve endured? Two years pretending to be the perfect fiancée, biting my tongue, smiling for the cameras, putting up with your moods and your disappearing acts. You think you can just toss me aside for a Rossman?”

Jayce’s face softened, but there was no comfort in it, just exhaustion, as if the weight of the last few years had finally come crashing down. “We never loved each other, Thalassa,” he said, his voice almost gentle. “It was always a contract. You wanted the Colt name, the power, the spotlight. I wanted my father off my back. But the contract’s over.”

Her face twisted, rage and heartbreak warring in her eyes. She turned that look on me, and it hit harder than any slap. “You really think you’ve won?” she spat. “You think you’re about to be some kind of princess? You’re just a placeholder, Veda, a walking womb to quench the flames of an old feud. When that baby’s born, you’ll see. Being a Colt is a cage, not a crown. You’ll learn soon enough what it costs to belong to this family.”

Jayce moved swiftly around the desk, his posture protective, voice rough with warning. “That’s enough, Thalassa.”

She yanked off her engagement ring, her knuckles white. For a moment, it seemed like she might hurl it at him, but instead she slammed it onto the desk, the sound like a gunshot in the silence. “Keep it,” she hissed. “Buy her something that doesn’t stink of desperation. But remember this, Jayce, my father doesn’t forgive, and neither do I. The mess you’re making will haunt you, and I sincerely hope she’s worth every bit of the disaster you’re about to unleash.”

With a final, searing glare, Thalassa spun on her heel and swept out, the silk of her dress trailing behind her like a war banner left behind on a battlefield. The door’s slam reverberated through the room, the silence that followed so heavy it was hard to breathe.

Jayce stood frozen, staring at the discarded ring as if it were a shackle he’d just unlocked. He looked wrung out, his shoulders bowed, not triumphant but defeated, a man who’d traded one prison for another, and wasn’t sure if the bars were any further apart.

“Jayce?” I whispered, my voice barely more than a breath.

He didn’t answer right away. Instead, he reached for the ring, turning it over in his hand, the diamond catching the light with cold, hard fire. Then, almost absently, he dropped it into a desk drawer and slammed it shut, the sound final, echoing.

“Get your things, Veda,” he said, his tone clipped and businesslike. “My driver will take you back to your father’s.”

I hesitated, hope and dread warring inside me. “You’re coming with me?” My words trembled in the thick air.

At last, Jayce looked at me. His eyes were hard, the earlier warmth gone, replaced by a kind of grim determination. “I have to. If we’re doing this, we should do it now. I’m not giving Arthur Rossman a chance to talk you out of it before we sign. He’ll try. He’ll do anything to make this go away.”

My heart squeezed tight. “He’s going to hate this,” I said, my voice shaking with the fear I’d been trying so hard to hide.

Jayce shrugged into his jacket, the motion stiff. “He’s going to hate me,” he said flatly. “But he’ll love the check my father’s sending to clear his debts. Everybody has a price, Veda. Turns out, I just found mine.” There was a hollow ring to his words, a bitterness that lingered in the air long after he’d spoken. In that moment, I realized that for all the power and money in the world, we were both just pawns, pieces in a game neither of us had ever really agreed to play.