Chapter 4

"About what happened in the warehouse — that was just fate being cruel."

"It already happened. Best to just forget it."

She paused, then took a step toward me.

"You got rained on?"

Something shifted in Brittany's face — the guilt finally surfacing. She rushed to the bathroom, grabbed a towel, and wrapped it around me.

"Brooks, don't do this to yourself."

"He's in my past, I know that. But that doesn't mean I can just switch it off."

"I know I hurt you and I hate myself for it. I'm only asking for one thing — just play along with me for a few days. Let me close this chapter with him, and then I'll end it. I promise. Can you do that for me?"

She looked up at me, tears balancing on the edge of her eyes. I looked past her at the wedding photo on the wall.

I thought about the day we took that photo. She wasn't smiling. There was only regret on her face.

I knew now that in that moment, she was probably wondering why the man standing beside her wasn't Leonardo.

I pressed my nails into my palm one more time — and then I let go.

"Fine."

Brittany's tears turned into a smile. She looked like a kid who'd just been handed a piece of candy.

Her phone buzzed. My agreement had given her all the permission she needed.

She stepped out to the balcony and spent the next hour talking to Leonardo in a low, sweet voice. The things she said were not meant for my ears.

I moved to the balcony of the adjacent room and smoked an entire pack, one cigarette after another.

The smoke stung my eyes. By the time the last cigarette was done, Brittany's phone was almost dead.

It didn't matter anymore. It was time to make this a clean ending.

I picked up my phone and made a call.

"Mom. I'm ready to sign the divorce papers and come home. Set up the arrangement you talked about — I'll go through with it."

My mother was stunned. She hadn't expected me to call her, let alone agree.

We talked briefly before I hung up. Then I texted a friend and asked him to draw up the divorce paperwork.

After that, I showered, got out, and didn't give a second thought to what Brittany was doing. I put my head down and slept.

Then she came bursting in, looking frantic.

"Brooks, get up!"

"Leonardo is on his way over right now. You can't be here. Go."

She was shoving me with one hand and tearing down the wedding photo from the wall with the other — along with anything else that was mine.

She lost her grip on the frame and it shattered on the floor. She didn't even look at it.

Before I could say a word, I was being pushed out the front door.

She pressed her hands together, giving me her most desperate look.

"You're the best. Please just work with me on this."

"I saved your life once. The scar is still on my wrist."

"You said you owed me. I'm calling that in right now."

I remembered what I'd said. I had no reason to refuse.

And because of what she'd done for me — taking a knife meant for me across her wrist — I had spent years giving her everything she asked for.

I didn't say anything. I just left.

She didn't come after me. Because the moment I stepped into the elevator, Leonardo stepped out of the one beside it.

In the split second before the doors closed, I saw them fold into each other.

I didn't remember until I reached the street that I had no change of clothes and no phone.

I stood under the dark sky with no idea where to go.

I sat alone in the little covered pavilion in the courtyard, cold all the way through, and didn't move until morning.

The next day, I was woken up by one of the building's staff.

"Mr. Brooks? Why are you sleeping out here?"

"That look on your face — you had a fight with your wife, didn't you?"

I smiled, but it didn't reach anything. I didn't answer the question.

What I hadn't expected was that I — heir to an entire company — would ever end up sleeping on a bench outside my own building.

As I stood up, I spotted Leonardo leaving the complex, looking deeply satisfied with himself.

This time, I felt absolutely nothing.