Chapter 31: Clean Slate

The first week back in Toronto, Julian became a ghost with a calendar.

Ellie understood. HaleCare, transitions, meetings that probably involved words she pretended to know. He texted anyway. Little check-ins that felt careful, considerate, very Julian.

How was your day? Busy? Did you eat?

She replied just enough to stay present without being present.

Good. Yeah. Yep 🙂

She did not mention that she was spending her days sprinting between auditions and job interviews with the manic optimism of someone who absolutely could not afford to give up yet.

Monday was three auditions and one interview. Tuesday was two auditions and an email that began with Unfortunately. Wednesday was a callback that turned into a polite smile and a suggestion that she was “very expressive” in a way that felt suspiciously final.

Ellie stayed cheerful through all of it.

She smiled at casting assistants. She thanked directors. She nodded thoughtfully when people told her she had potential, which she was starting to suspect was code for not this time and probably not ever. She went home exhausted, kicked off her shoes, and opened her laptop to look for more opportunities, because momentum was important and despair was rude.

The next morning brought more rejections.

Lack of experience. Not the right fit. We went with someone else.

She kept going anyway. If she stopped, she would think. Thinking was dangerous.

She made excuses when Julian asked why she had not dropped by his office. She said she was busy. She said she was meeting friends. One morning he stopped by Ethan’s place and she was not there. Ethan said she had gone out early. Julian did not ask more.

By Thursday, the cheerfulness evaporated.

The last audition of the day ended with a director sighing and saying maybe she should consider other careers, because he had seen her audition for five of his plays already.

Ellie smiled. Thanked him. Walked out.

She stood in an alley behind the theater and unwrapped a sandwich she had shoved into her bag that morning. If she ate, she would not cry. That was the rule. Crying required an audience and she was not ready for Ethan’s concerned face yet.

Her phone rang.

Julian.

She stared at it and let it ring out. If she heard his voice, she would lose it.

She took another bite of the sandwich. Her phone rang again.

On the third call, she answered.

“Yeah,” she said, trying to sound casual and failing quietly.

“Are you busy?” Julian asked.

“No, not really. I just got out of an audition.”

There was a pause. Not the distracted kind. The listening kind.

“How was it?”

That was it. That was the crack.

“Rejected,” she said, and laughed, which immediately betrayed her because her voice wobbled and her eyes burned and suddenly she was crying anyway.

“Where are you?” he asked.

“I’m just outside O’Hara Theatre. I’m going home and—”

“Don’t move. I’m five minutes away.”

“Julian—”

“Don’t argue with me,” he said, and the line went dead.

Ellie stared at her phone.

When would she stop needing people like this? Would she ever survive on her own? Probably not. She would be homeless and live on granola bars and eventually perish in a bus shelter.

Five minutes passed. The sandwich disappeared. Julian’s car pulled into the alley.

He stepped out, took one look at her, and before she could say anything useful or brave or self-deprecating, the first thing out of her mouth was, “I’m never good at anything.”

Julian closed the distance and wrapped his arms around her.

Ellie let herself lean into him, tears soaking into his coat, the city buzzing around them like nothing had just cracked open.

---

Julian did not plan on bringing Ellie to his apartment.

The plan had been to drop her off, make sure she was steady, send a follow-up text later that night that said something neutral and responsible. Unfortunately, Ellie cried in his car the entire way, quiet at first and then with hiccuping little breaths she kept apologizing for, and he decided he was not dealing with Ethan’s concerned stare or Hannah’s gentle interrogation tonight.

So now they were on his couch.

Ellie leaned into him, her head tipped against his shoulder, his arm around her almost by accident. His hand rubbed absently up and down her arm, a grounding habit he had not consciously chosen. It was either that or start problem-solving out loud, which he suspected would get him punched.

“Do you need money for anything?” he asked, because he was him and this was how he checked on people.

“No,” Ellie said, exhaling hard. “I just wanted to find something for me, you know? I don’t want to feel helpless if you or Ethan finally decide to get rid of me.”

Julian frowned. “I don’t think your brother would do that.”

Ellie snorted. “He won’t. And that’s the problem. I’m no longer his responsibility.”

Julian hesitated, then reached for logic, because it was familiar and solid. “We have a ten-year contract, remember? You’re stable for the next ten years.”

She did not answer.

That silence sat heavier than he expected. He realized, belatedly, that saying ten-year contract to someone who felt disposable was probably not reassuring. He adjusted slightly, enough that she could feel him there.

“You can tell me anything,” he said.

Ellie straightened, pulling back just enough to pick at her nails. “Your ex-wife is really pretty.”

That caught his attention.

He resisted the urge to immediately counter it with facts or reassurances. This did not sound like insecurity. This sounded like a detour she needed to take before getting to the actual problem. He waited.

“And the more I stay with you,” she continued, smiling in a way that did not reach her eyes, “the more obvious it is that I don’t really belong in your life. You hired me because you thought I wouldn’t get too involved, and I’m failing at that job too.”

Julian’s jaw tightened.

“I’m starting to get confused about what we are,” she went on. “And I’d get it if you fired me, because that’s not what we agreed to.”

She kept going, words tumbling now. “I’m not someone you could be proud of, Julian. Even as a fake wife. I’m not even proud of myself. I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t want to rely on anyone, but nobody’s giving me a chance. I’m not even making sense right now.”

Julian stared straight ahead.

Everything she said made sense. Uncomfortably so.

He had built this structure. He had written the rules. He had crossed them first. Her confusion was not a failure of character. It was the predictable result of putting a human being into a contract and then treating her like more than that without explaining himself.

He argued with himself in quick succession. End the arrangement. Start clean. Do not entangle money with feelings. Except she was struggling, and he could fix that, and she hated being fixed. Except letting her flounder felt worse. Except he was already too far in to pretend neutrality.

He hated that she looked defeated. This was not the Ellie who annoyed him daily with questions and commentary and opinions. This was someone shrinking.

“If there’s anyone to blame, it’s me,” he said finally. “I took control of the situation, and there are complications. Mostly because of me.”

Ellie looked at him, listening.

“I’m not good at this,” he admitted. “but I’ve been thinking of ending this arrangement.”

Her expression changed instantly, and he rushed to clarify before the damage landed.

“So we can start on a clean slate,” he added. “I don’t want you to feel pressured, and I don’t want to second-guess everything just because money is involved.”

She smiled, faintly.

“But,” Julian continued, because of course there was a but, “I also can’t sit here and watch you struggle when I can help. Do you see how complicated that is?”

Ellie nodded.

He knew what she needed in that moment was reassurance. Validation. Something gentle and emotional. He also knew, with a sinking certainty, that it would not be enough.

He sighed. “You can stay here in Toronto.”

---

Ellie panicked.

Not outwardly. Outwardly she nodded and blinked and tried to look reasonable. Internally, every thought tripped over the next one.

Stay in Toronto. That was fast. She had just finished a whole emotional speech about independence and now he was casually rearranging geography. Could he at least pretend this was a negotiation?

“What about HaleCare?” she asked.

“I’ll talk to Margaret,” Julian said. “We’ll figure it out.”

She looked at him properly then. Not CEO Julian. Not composed Julian. Just a man sitting on his couch with his shoulders slightly hunched, eyes tired, jaw set too tight. He looked…conflicted. And Julian did not do conflicted.

“Being with someone again was never on my to-do list,” he said. “It disrupts things I’ve spent years keeping orderly. That disruption happens to be you.”

Ellie was about to say something when Julian interrupted her, “And before you overthink what I just said, I’m not saying that’s a bad thing.”

“And it annoys me that you’re confused about where you are in my life,” he added. “That means I’m not doing a good job.”

Her chest did a strange, sharp thing at that. He was not blaming her. He was blaming himself. That was new. Alarming, even.

“So stay here,” Julian said. “Do whatever you have to do. But let me support you. Once you find a job, and you will, we stop this. We divorce officially.”

Ellie held very still.

“So we can start on a clean slate,” he said. “No money attached to feelings. No guessing whether you’re allowed to be here.”

Clean slate.

Her brain latched onto that phrase and refused to let go. Clean slate meant choice. It meant no paycheck attached to affection. It meant he was not asking her to leave, just asking her to stay without pretending it was business.

“That’s the best compromise I can give, Elena,” he said.

Ellie stared at him for a beat too long.

“So,” she said slowly, “you mean you like me?”

Julian looked at her, unimpressed. “I wouldn’t bring a charger at one in the morning for anyone.”

Her mouth curved despite herself. “Like like? For real?”

“I’m not going to say that,” he replied flatly.

“Say it.”

“No.”

“Julian.”

He shot her a look. She leaned closer, eyes bright, absolutely unbearable.

“Say it,” she repeated, softer this time.

“Don’t question your place in my life,” he said finally. “You’re my wife. And whatever this is now, it’s more than the paper we signed.”

He paused, jaw tight.

“and you know I don’t say things lightly.”

Ellie smiled and leaned over to kiss him.

She knew what it looked like from the outside. Staying. Letting someone help. Letting things be complicated.

But she also knew what happened when she tried to be brave by herself.

She burned out. She ran out. She disappeared quietly.

Julian wasn’t offering rescue. He was offering time.

And for once, she was going to use it instead of wasting it on pride.

Chapter 32: Final Interview

Pearson International Airport was doing what airports did best. Too loud, too bright, too rushed for feelings that wanted to linger.

Ellie hugged Margaret carefully, aware of the soft wool of her coat, the faint perfume that probably cost more than Ellie’s monthly groceries. “Thank you for everything,” she said, and meant it. “And I’m sorry I can’t fly back with you. I have some urgent things to handle in Toronto.”

Margaret pulled back just enough to look at her properly. Really look. The kind of look that made Ellie feel fourteen again and vaguely guilty for reasons she couldn’t name.

“You and Julian aren’t having marital problems, are you?” Margaret asked.

Ellie smiled, smooth and practiced. Theatre training finally paying off. “Not at all. Just personal things. We talked about it. He agreed it makes more sense for him to go with you.”

Margaret hummed, unconvinced but letting it go. She kissed Ellie’s cheek, firm and affectionate. “Take care of yourself, Elena. Don’t disappear.”

Then she was gone, swept into security with purpose and authority, leaving Ellie standing there with Julian and a strange, buzzing quiet between them.

Ellie shoved her hands into her coat pockets. “So,” she said, rocking slightly on her heels. “See you next month?”

Julian adjusted his grip on his carry-on. “Depends.”

“On what?”

“My patience,” he said.

She laughed, because it sounded like a threat but landed like a joke. He looked at her then, eyes sharp but warm in that annoying way that made her feel seen and unsettled at the same time.

“Although,” he added, almost casually, “I’ve flown back for less. I’d fly back here even if it were just for a lost charger.”

Ellie blinked. “You’re never letting that go, are you?”

“No,” he said. “Absolutely not.”

She smiled before she could stop herself. “You’ll miss your flight.”

“I’ll call you.” He turned and started walking toward the gate.

Ellie watched him go, her chest doing that quiet, traitorous tightening thing. Then Julian suddenly started walking back toward her, decisively this time.

“You forgot something?” she asked.

He didn’t answer. He leaned in and kissed her, slow and certain and entirely unconcerned with the people dragging suitcases past them. Someone nearby made an awkward noise. Julian ignored it.

“I’m your husband,” he said softly when he pulled back, pinching her cheeks with familiar affection. “Remember that.”

Then he turned and walked away for real.

Ellie stood there, stunned, one hand lifting to her face as if she needed to confirm the kiss had actually happened. Her cheeks were warm. Her heart was doing something unhelpful and dramatic.

“I’m still his wife,” she murmured to herself.

And she smiled all the way out of the airport.

---

Ellie had officially stopped doing open calls and started looking for jobs more seriously.

She sat at her kitchen table with Seb’s emails open, a half-cold coffee at her elbow, and a browser filled with job listings that sounded only mildly terrifying. Production assistant. Coordinator. Front of house. Anything that didn’t involve waiting in line at six in the morning just to be told she had “interesting energy” and then never hear back.

Seb, bless him, sent her prospects with short notes attached.

This one’s real. This one pays. This one does not look sketchy.

Ellie clicked. Applied. Customized her resume until it barely resembled her life. Hit submit. Tried not to think too hard.

Her phone rang.

Unknown number.

She stared at it. Then answered because avoidance had not been working out for her lately.

“Hello?”

“Hi, may I speak with Elena Bennett?”

“Yes, this is her.” Her voice went polite.

“Hi, this is Mara calling from Northbridge Theatre Collective. I’m following up on your interview yesterday.”

Ellie froze. Her brain did that thing where it shut down everything except panic.

“Yes,” she said, very calmly for someone who had just mentally screamed.

“We’d love to move you forward to the final round. Could you come in the day after tomorrow at four p.m.?”

She blinked. “Yes. Absolutely. I can. I will. I mean, yes.”

Mara laughed, kind. “Great. We’ll see you then.”

The call ended.

Ellie stared at her phone.

She stood up. Sat down. Walked two steps. Whispered “oh my god” to the fridge.

Final round.

Final.

She didn’t even let herself overthink it before texting Julian.

You busy?

The reply came almost instantly.

Wrapping up a call. I’ll call you in five.

She smiled at her phone, soft and stupid.

Of course he would. He always did.

They hadn’t seen each other in two weeks. Not in person. But every day he checked in. Every night there was a call, sometimes video, sometimes voice, Julian listening while she ranted and jumped topics and talked herself into and out of despair. He never rushed her. Never multitasked. Just sat there with that perpetually annoyed face that somehow meant he was fully present.

Ethan did the same thing with Hannah. No matter how exhausted he was, he still helped with school projects, still listened. Ellie had noticed that years ago. She noticed it now.

Five minutes later, Julian’s face filled her screen. He looked tired. Tie loosened. Hair out of place.

“How are you?” she asked immediately.

“Better now,” he said.

Her chest did a small, traitorous flip at that.

“Everything good?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she said, then rushed ahead before she lost her nerve. “Okay, question. Are you too busy to maybe do a mock interview with me? Or something?”

His eyebrow shot up. “What position is this for?”

“Production Coordinator for a theatre house. In-house. They run multiple productions every year. It’s real. It’s the final interview and I am actively freaking out because I have never made it this far.”

She watched his mouth twitch. He leaned closer to the camera, trying very hard not to smile.

“All right,” he said. “Let’s hear it.”

He didn’t ease her in.

“Why do you want this role?”

She opened her mouth, panicked, then rambled. He stopped her gently. Rephrased her answer. Asked again.

“What’s your biggest weakness?”

She groaned. “Existing?”

“Try again.”

They went through questions. He cut in with advice. Told her when she undersold herself. Called her out when she deflected with humor.

“You realize coordination and being calm under pressure are skills, right?,” he said at one point.

“They are?” she replied. “Okay.”

By the end, her shoulders had dropped. Her breathing had steadied.

“When’s the interview?” he asked.

“Day after tomorrow. Northbridge Theatre Collective,” she said, anxiety creeping back in. “I just wish you were here.”

“Few more months,” Julian said.

She nodded, smiling anyway.

---

The interview ended without drama, which somehow felt suspicious.

Ellie sat there nodding, smiling, hands folded so tightly in her lap they were practically shaking hands with each other. The panel exchanged looks. Someone thanked her for coming. Someone else shuffled papers.

Then the woman in the middle smiled and said, “We’d love to offer you the position. You can start next week.”

Ellie blinked.

“Oh,” she said, because her brain had temporarily powered down. Then, louder, “Oh. Oh! Yes. Yes, absolutely. Thank you. I mean, thank you so much.”

She stood up too fast. Almost knocked her chair over. Apologized to the chair. Shook hands. Walked out of the room in a daze and only stopped once she outside in the parking lot.

She had a job.

An actual job.

She pulled her phone out with trembling hands and hit Julian’s name before she could talk herself into being calm.

“How was it?” he asked.

“I got it!” she shrieked.

“Jesus,” Julian said, clearly wincing on the other end. “I’ll take you to dinner.”

“Yeah?” she said, grinning so hard her face hurt. “Can’t wait.”

“Now.”

“Now?” She turned and there he was.

Leaning against his car, phone to his ear, smirk already in place, jacket open, looking far too composed for someone who had apparently materialized out of thin air.

Ellie screamed again and ran up to him.

“I got the job!” she said, bouncing on her toes, grabbing his arm. “I got the job. Can you believe it?”

Julian didn’t answer. He slid his phone into his pocket and pulled her into him, arms solid and warm and unmistakably real.

“You missed me?” she asked, her voice muffled against his chest.

“No,” he said, hugging her tighter.

Ellie laughed. “You didn’t tell me you were coming.”

“I don’t miss celebrations,” he said. “But I need to go back tonight, so we don’t have much time.”

She pulled back just enough to look up at him. “You took a flight just for this? What if I didn’t get the job?”

“I would’ve flown either way,” he said.

Ellie smiled, even though she tried not to. Julian had a habit of showing up in ways that felt wildly inconvenient for him and impossible for her to ignore.

She leaned back into him, breathing him in, smiling into his shirt. “You’re annoying,” she muttered.

“I know.”

Chapter 33: Coming Home

Julian had been on the call for forty minutes when he realized he had stopped listening to his own voice.

That was usually a sign of exhaustion or irritation. Possibly both.

Seb was on the other end, patient as ever, which Julian both appreciated and resented. He paced the length of the temporary office, phone wedged between shoulder and ear, staring at a spreadsheet that had no business existing in its current form.

“I don’t know,” Julian said finally, rubbing his temple. “The transition is giving me headaches. HaleCare is bleeding money because Margaret refuses to let people go. She won’t do it herself, she won’t let me do it, and now it’s apparently my moral failing.”

Seb hummed. The sound of someone who had heard this tone before.

“That sounds very on brand for your grandmother,” Seb said. “Also very on brand for you to inherit the problem instead of pushing back.”

“I am pushing back,” Julian said automatically. Then he paused. “I am pushing back internally. Strategically.”

“Of course you are,” Seb said. “So when are you coming back to Toronto for good?”

Julian stopped pacing. He stared at the window.

“I don’t know,” he repeated. “Soon. I hope.”

Seb was quiet for a second. Then, casually, “How are you and Ellie?”

Julian frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I mean,” Seb said, carefully neutral, “I don’t think the marriage is working as professional as it is supposed to be. She dropped by the other day. Brought me coffee. Asked if I’d heard from you because you hadn’t responded to her in four days.”

Julian stilled.

Four days?

“She wasn’t angry,” Seb added. “She seemed worried. Are you sure there isn’t something else going on?”

Julian opened his mouth. Closed it again.

On the other end, Seb exhaled slowly. “Oh my god. Okay. I’m not pushing, but that absolutely deserves a face-to-face conversation.”

“Whatever,” Julian said, and ended the call before Seb could turn that into a lecture.

He stood there for a moment, phone still in his hand, irritation curling into something less comfortable.

He wanted to go back to Toronto. That part was simple. The longer he stayed here, the clearer it became that no one else could handle HaleCare without running it into the ground. Giving it to his brother would be corporate suicide, and Margaret knew it. She just hadn’t said it out loud yet.

And Julian did not want her dying without knowing the truth. He didn’t want her last lucid thought to be that her grandson had played a clean game when he hadn’t.

He also didn’t want to think about Ellie counting days on her calendar.

Julian sighed, already irritated with himself for the delay. Then he straightened his jacket, turned on his heel, and headed for Margaret’s office.

Procrastination, he decided, was becoming a recurring and deeply unflattering habit.

---

Julian did not bother knocking.

“I need to go back to Toronto so I can properly manage the shitshow that is HaleCare,” he said as he walked in. “Doing this remotely is inefficient, borderline negligent, and making me hostile.”

Margaret looked up from her book, unimpressed. “Good evening to you too.”

He took the chair across from her desk anyway. “And I want you to come with me.”

Margaret’s mouth twitched. “Why would I do that? You know I hate Toronto.”

“I know,” Julian said. “But I need to be there. And I don’t want to leave you here.”

She waved him off, already dismissing the idea. “I understand the need. I would still rather die here. I have people, routines, and the benefit of not dealing with Toronto traffic. I’ll be fine.”

Julian exhaled through his nose. He had expected resistance. He still disliked it.

“Also,” he said, shifting forward, “I need to tell you something.”

Margaret closed her book, slow and deliberate, and finally gave him her full attention. “That tone usually means I won’t enjoy this. Go on.”

“It’s about me and Ellie.”

Her expression sharpened, interest replacing indulgence.

“We got married because I asked her to,” Julian said.

Margaret chuckled. “Yes, Julian. That is traditionally how marriages happen.”

“No,” he said, irritation creeping in. “I mean because I needed HaleCare. Not out of greed. I wanted to keep it alive. I still do. I fully intend to share it with Lucy someday. But with the conditions you set, I made a calculated decision. Ellie is not a musician. She’s a theatre actress. She needed work. I asked her to play a role.”

Margaret arched a brow. “So you and Elena made a fool out of me.”

“If anyone did, it was me,” Julian said without hesitation. “Ellie did exactly what I asked. And now I want to divorce her.”

Margaret leaned back. “Care to explain why? She wants out?”

“No,” Julian said. “We both want to start again. Without transactions attached.”

Margaret hummed, thoughtful. “So what you are saying is, you are divorcing her in order to be with her.”

“Yes,” Julian said, relieved she had arrived there without him spelling it out. “And I know we had an agreement. But given HaleCare’s current state, I am the only person who can manage it without causing further damage. You can give it to someone else if you want. It doesn’t matter. Let me oversee it until it stabilizes.”

Margaret smiled then, slow and knowing. “Julian, I’ve known for some time that you and Elena weren’t married in the usual sense.”

His spine went rigid.

How?

Had they slipped? Had Ellie said something? Had he miscalculated, underestimated her perception, Margaret’s?

“I am old,” she said mildly, “but I am not stupid.”

Julian did not respond. Experience had taught him that interrupting Margaret when she was winding up was a poor survival strategy.

“Lucy clocked it too,” Margaret continued. “You do know how convenient it was when you suddenly had a fiancée the moment I laid out my conditions? I was amused you actually followed through so I decided to play along.”

So that was the word. Amused.

Julian kept his face neutral. He did not deny it. He had nothing to gain by pretending otherwise.

“And,” Margaret went on, “in my own way, I have been testing Ellie. I asked Vivienne to offer her two million.”

Julian’s spine went rigid.

“They weren’t serious about HaleCare,” Margaret said. “They played their parts well enough. Convincing, even. Ellie surprised me when she declined, even when you signed a prenup.”

For a brief, deeply uncomfortable moment, Julian realized he had been the only one in the room who did not know he was being evaluated.

All along, he had thought he was managing variables. Structuring outcomes. Controlling risk.

Instead, he had been the case study.

“This is…” Julian said, then stopped. He actually had no words, which was new and unpleasant. “I genuinely don’t have words for this.”

“You passed,” Margaret said simply.

He frowned. “Excuse me?”

“It’s true,” she continued, unbothered. “I worried you’d end up alone and run HaleCare the way you run hedge fund managers. Efficient. Cold. Disposable. But I’ve been watching you. You commit to things and follow through even when they inconvenience you. That matters to me.”

She paused, then added, “Ellie being with you is a bonus. Such a sweet girl.”

Julian exhaled slowly, trying to recalibrate his entire understanding of the last year.

“I don’t know what to say,” he admitted.

Margaret smiled. “You could thank me for not disowning you after deliberately misleading your own grandmother.”

Julian rubbed his temple, torn between relief and the creeping realization that Margaret Hale was far more dangerous than he would ever be.

“Thank you,” he said at last.

It was the safest response available.

---

Three months turned out to be both shorter and longer than Ellie expected.

Shorter because her days were suddenly full in a way they had never been before. Longer because Julian had become a person who existed mostly in her phone, and lately, not even that.

Her job was busy in the unglamorous, deeply untheatrical way. Production schedules. Budget spreadsheets, coordinating rehearsal rooms, herding directors who thought time was a suggestion and actors who thought they were the exception. Making sure costumes arrived. Making sure props did not disappear. Making sure someone remembered to book the understudy.

It was a lot of emails. So many emails. But she was good at it.

She still imagined getting cast in something. That fantasy had not died. It just waited patiently while she sent calendar invites.

Ethan worried less. That alone felt like a win.

Julian, on the other hand, had gone quiet.

Her last message sat there, read, unanswered.

Ellie was not mad. She refused to be mad. They were not officially anything. They were…complicated-adjacent. Together-ish, on a technicality, with feelings that were definitely not in the contract. Seb had mentioned, casually and with alarming calm, that Julian barely slept anymore. HaleCare was a mess. Julian was doing damage control on a scale Ellie could not even picture.

She did not want to be another problem. She really did not want to be clingy.

Still.

She was halfway through coordinating a last minute lighting change when her phone rang. She ignored it, because that was what professional people did. Then it rang again.

Julian.

She mumbled something about grabbing coffee and ducked into the stairwell before answering.

“Hey, stranger,” she said, aiming for casual and landing somewhere near hopeful.

“Can you talk?”

“For a couple of minutes,” she said. “What’s up?”

“I’m on my way home.”

Home as in… home?

“Home?” she repeated carefully.

“Toronto.”

Her brain stalled, then sprinted. “Like today?”

“I’m at the airport.”

“Oh.” She swallowed. “Did something happen?”

“I’ll tell you when I get there,” he said. “Just checking in. The last few days have been crazy.”

“I know,” she said quickly.

Someone called her name from down the hall, urgent and slightly panicked.

“I gotta go,” Ellie said. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow? I’ll wait for you at the airport.”

“You’re free?”

“I’ll fake an illness,” she whispered.

“Elena Bennett,” Julian said, and she could hear the smile in his voice, “three months in and already faking an illness.”

“Shut up,” she said, grinning despite herself. “See you.”

She hung up, leaned her forehead against the concrete wall, and tried very hard not to smile too much.

He was coming home.

---

Ellie had been jumping on her heels for ten full minutes, which was not nervous energy, thank you very much, just circulation. Airports were cold. Also time moved differently when you were waiting for someone you definitely had not been thinking about every night for three months.

She could not believe she missed his stupid face. The particular way his mouth flattened when he was concentrating. The annoyed crease between his brows. The way he looked at her as if she were a problem he kept choosing to solve anyway.

She had the day off. She made sure her hair behaved. She checked her breath twice. She kept telling herself to calm down. She failed at that repeatedly.

Then she saw him.

Julian Hale, walking through arrivals with his usual purposeful stride, scanning the crowd as if the airport might try to waste his time. The sight of him did something unhelpful to her lungs. She smiled and immediately tried to dial it back, pretending she was just someone casually standing there and not someone resisting the urge to sprint.

He spotted her.

The look on his face shifted. Subtle, but she caught it. Relief, maybe. Something warmer than his usual default.

He walked straight to her, dropped his carry on without ceremony, and before she could say a single rehearsed thing, he grabbed her and kissed her. Right there. Public place. No warning.

Ellie froze for exactly half a second before her brain stopped working entirely.

“You smell nice,” she said, because apparently that was all her system could generate.

He huffed out something that might have been a laugh, forehead resting briefly against hers, and Ellie decided that yes, she had absolutely missed him.

Chapter 34: Progress

“WHAT?!”

“Elena,” Julian said calmly, from across the room, “lower your voice.”

“WHAT HAPPENED?” Ellie repeated anyway.

She spent the rest of the afternoon curled into the corner of Julian’s couch, knees tucked to her chest, watching him unpack. She offered to help once. He looked at her, mildly horrified, and said she was not his maid. She did not argue, mostly because she was enjoying the couch and the fact that he was here and real and unpacking his life back into Toronto.

It was somewhere between him hanging up a jacket and tossing an empty toiletry bag into the trash that he said, casually, “Margaret knew why we got married in the first place.”

Ellie sat up so fast she nearly fell off the couch.

“What did she say?” Her brain sprinted ahead of her mouth. “Was she mad? Disappointed? Did she sigh dramatically? Is she planning my disappearance? Oh my god, she’s planning my disappearance. This is how rich people do it, right? Suddenly I’m gone.”

Julian glanced at her, unimpressed, and kept folding a sweater. “She just knew from the start.”

Ellie deflated a little. “I wasn’t very convincing, wasn’t I?”

“No,” he said, then paused. “Actually, you were. Margaret is just…something else.”

Ellie leaned back, staring at the ceiling. Ellie wasn’t sure if she felt relieved or exposed. Probably both. Mostly she felt small in that way she hated, the way that made her wonder if she had ever fooled anyone at all.

Julian zipped the now-empty suitcase shut and walked over. He sat down close.

“I still have HaleCare,” he said.

“Do you still want it?” Ellie asked, softer now. “Seb said it’s been messy.”

“Not really,” Julian said. “But I have to do it.”

She didn’t answer. She watched his face instead. He looked tired in a way that went deeper than sleep. She should give him space so he can rest. She knew that. Instead, she scooted closer and leaned into his side, her head against his shoulder, because apparently her instincts were not taking suggestions today.

“Everything okay with work?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

He wrapped an arm around her, solid and familiar. Then, without changing his tone, he said, “I think this is the best time for us to get divorced.”

The word landed softly and still knocked the air out of her.

Ellie stared at the far wall, thoughts tripping over each other. It made sense. Too much sense. Margaret knew. The arrangement had served its purpose. And whatever this was between them had outgrown paperwork and contracts and pretending. Julian wanted to make it real. She understood that. She did.

What she didn’t have was clarity. He told her not to question her place in his life, and she tried. God, she tried. But she was not built for ambiguity, and Julian was not built for speeches. One day she would need reassurance in plain words, not implications and gestures and showing up when it mattered.

She wasn’t sure if that day would come.

Ellie exhaled slowly. “I’ll sign the papers.”

---

The coffee shop was too bright for a conversation that felt this awkward. Ellie sat across from Julian, fingers wrapped around a mug she had not touched in five minutes.

“So apparently,” she said, “divorce gets finalized if you haven’t been living together for a year. We stopped living together five months ago.”

Julian nodded, unbothered.

“I didn’t know that,” Ellie added, then frowned. “Did you?” A beat. “Never mind. You’ve been married before.”

“It’s in the contract,” Julian said. “You didn’t read all of it, did you?”

Ellie smiled brightly. She absolutely did not. “Wow. Look at that latte art,” she said, expertly changing the subject. “So what now?”

“Now that it’s filed, we wait seven more months,” Julian said, sipping his coffee.

Seven months of waiting. Ellie nodded, then immediately realized that was not what she meant.

“Cool,” she repeated. “So what now?” she asked again.

Julian set his cup down and looked at her, calm and patient and infuriatingly unreadable.

Ellie shifted in her seat. “We can still be…together-ish, right?” she asked. “Are we still allowed to see each other?”

“It’s a divorce, Elena,” he said dryly. “Not a restraining order.”

Her shoulders relaxed, then stiffened again because that still did not answer the question she was actually asking. Ellie stared at the table, then back at him. Her brain was already spiraling ahead. Contracts were easy. Rules were easy. Feelings were not.

“I guess I need to know where we stand now,” she said, quieter. “Now that we filed. What does clean slate even mean for you?”

She hated how much she needed him to answer that.

---

Julian had already answered the question in his head three different ways before Ellie finished asking it. None of them sounded right out loud.

He watched her across the table, the way she leaned forward when she was anxious, the way her fingers worried the edge of her mug. She kept asking because she was trying to locate herself in the absence of rules. He understood rules. He built his life around them. Ellie did not. Ellie needed orientation. Context. Reassurance delivered in full sentences instead of assumptions.

He had always considered words the most unreliable currency. People overused them. Misused them. Promised things they had no intention of following through on. He preferred action. It was cleaner. Verifiable. If he showed up, stayed, paid attention, that should have been enough.

Clearly, it was not.

Julian exhaled quietly and accepted that this was not a flaw on her part. It was a mismatch he had been pretending did not exist. Ellie was not asking to trap him. She was asking because ambiguity made her feel unmoored, and he had put her there.

He shifted in his chair, then moved closer, sliding into the empty seat beside her. He reached for her hand, grounding himself in the warmth of it before speaking.

“I want you to get to know me first,” Julian said, steady and unpolished. “Before deciding if you want to be with me.”

Ellie stared at their joined hands, Julian’s thumb rested against her knuckles, warm and steady, annoyingly grounding. Her brain, on the other hand, was doing laps.

Get to know him first. Before deciding.

Okay. Reasonable. Sensible. Mature. All the words people used right before everything got emotionally complicated.

She understood why he said it. Julian approached life the way other people approached IKEA furniture. Read everything first. Lay out the parts. Follow the steps. Ellie, meanwhile, had always been more of a grab-the-Allen-key-and-hope-for-the-best person.

Still, something in his carefulness tugged at her.

She wasn’t offended. She wasn’t insulted. But she was…itchy.

Ellie lifted her gaze to him, studying his face. He looked calm in that hyper-focused way he got when he was bracing for pushback. As if he expected her to bolt or argue or cry. She could see him managing the situation in real time, and it made her chest ache a little.

“I know you’re trying to be careful,” she said slowly. “And I appreciate that. I really do.”

Julian didn’t interrupt.

“But I should probably say this out loud before my brain turns it into a whole unnecessary spiral.” She paused, then rushed on before she chickened out. “I’m inexperienced, not clueless.”

His brow furrowed slightly.

“I haven’t done… a lot,” she continued, heat creeping up her neck. “But I know what I’m choosing. I’m not confused about wanting you. And sometimes it feels like you’re handling me as if I might shatter if you breathe wrong.”

She gave a small, crooked smile. “I promise I’m sturdier than I look.”

Julian exhaled through his nose, something between a sigh and a quiet laugh.

“That’s not what I think of you,” he said. “At all.”

She watched his jaw tighten, the tell that meant he was choosing his words instead of defaulting to silence.

“I think you’re brave,” he went on. “And impulsive. And far more capable than you give yourself credit for. Which is exactly why I don’t want to rush you into something just because I’m…already there.”

Ellie leaned back slightly, absorbing that. She could see his logic now. It wasn’t doubt. It was restraint. The frustrating, grown-up kind.

She nodded. “Okay. That makes sense. I don’t love it, but it makes sense.”

His mouth twitched.

“So,” she said, squeezing his hand once, “we take it one step at a time. No contracts. No rules. Justus figuring it out as we go.”

Julian studied her for a moment, then nodded.

“One step at a time,” he agreed. “At a pace we both choose.”

Ellie smiled, lighter than she had been all morning.

“Good,” she said. “Because I’d hate to rush you into liking me.”

Julian couldn’t help but to chuckle. He leaned in before his brain could overtake the moment and kissed Ellie’s temple.

Ellie didn’t pull away. She relaxed into him.

Then, because she was Ellie and peace never lasted long, she tipped her head just enough to look at him and said, “So. Let’s start with the basics. Why did you and your ex-wife separate?”

There it was. No warm-up. No buffer. Straight to the structural integrity test.

He shifted slightly so they were facing the same direction, shoulders touching, his hand still loosely holding hers.

“It wasn’t dramatic,” he said. “No cheating. No betrayal. We just grew apart.”

Ellie waited. He could feel it. She always waited for the part people usually skipped.

“She tried longer than I did,” he added. “That’s the part I don’t love admitting.”

His thumb traced a slow, absent line along her knuckles.

“I’m not easy to live with,” he continued. “I default to control when I don’t know what I’m doing. I prioritize work because it gives me measurable outcomes. She wanted more presence than I knew how to give at the time.”

Ellie stayed quiet, eyes forward, listening.

“It was mutual in the end,” Julian said. “But I know I drove us there. Not intentionally, but it still counts.”

He glanced at Ellie then, just briefly, to gauge the damage. She looked thoughtful, not scared. That felt encouraging and dangerous at the same time.

“That’s why I said what I said earlier,” he went on. “About you getting to know me first. I’m not trying to protect myself. I’m trying to be honest about the terrain.”

Ellie’s fingers tightened around his.

“I’m not going to promise I won’t hurt you,” Julian said quietly. “I will. At some point. Not because I want to. Because people do. I can promise I’ll try not to. I can promise I won’t pretend I’m someone easier than I am.”

He paused, then added, “And I don’t want to give you a reason to walk away that I could have been upfront about now.”

Ellie turned toward him then, and Julian felt that familiar, unsettling awareness that she saw more than he ever intended to show.

“Okay,” she said simply.

She didn’t know yet if she could live with all of that. But she knew she respected him for saying it.

Chapter 35: Dangerous Game

The next couple of months slid by in a way Ellie could only describe as quietly strange.

Things were good. If good meant Julian checking in once a day, sometimes with a short question, sometimes just a “home safe?” that felt disproportionately comforting. HaleCare was clearly devouring his sanity, and she could tell when his replies went from full sentences to clipped acknowledgments. There were days he didn’t respond at all. She didn’t love that part, but when he did reappear, he reappeared fully. Picking her up after work. Dropping off food. Sending her home with leftovers she definitely did not ask for.

She learned the rhythm. Julian vanished into chaos, then resurfaced with practical affection.

One afternoon, that affection arrived in a branded paper bag so expensive it made her coworkers stop mid-conversation.

“Ellie,” one of them said slowly, eyeing the logo. “Is that from Auberge Laurent?”

Ellie looked down at the bag, then at them, then back at the bag again. “Yes.”

“How can you afford that?”

Ellie smiled the smile of someone who had absolutely no intention of explaining her life choices. “Budgeting.”

She sat down, opened the container, and ate every bite without sharing. She did not feel guilty. She felt victorious.

And okay. Fine. There was another thing.

Ellie wanted to get laid.

Badly.

She was almost twenty-nine. She shaved regularly. She owned skincare now. She had done the emotional work. The self-reflection. The whole I-am-a-grown-woman montage. She was not asking for marriage. She wasn’t even asking for declarations. Technically, they were still married, which was its own ridiculous layer, but still.

Julian would kiss her senseless, hands steady, mouth devastating, and then stop. Every time. Right when her brain shut off and her body started making decisions without consulting her.

She hated it.

Not him. The stopping.

She also hated that she did not want to initiate. She could, theoretically. She had a mouth. She had courage. She had Google. But something in her balked. Was it wrong to want him to want it first? Was she being dramatic? Probably. Did she care? Not even a little.

She lay awake some nights staring at the ceiling, thinking about her own frustration with the same efficiency Julian used to dismantle businesses. She was patient. She understood his pace. She respected boundaries.

She was also incredibly, painfully, distractingly horny.

Ellie sighed into her pillow, rolled onto her side, and decided she would not text him about it. Not yet. Maybe tomorrow. Or maybe she’d just kiss him harder next time and see what happened.

That seemed reasonable.

---

Ellie pressed the doorbell twice, because once felt tentative and three felt reckless.

The door opened and her brain stalled.

Julian was shirtless.

Just standing there, casual about it, hair a little rumpled, skin warm-toned and unfairly real. Ellie stared. She registered the broad sweep of his shoulders, the quiet strength in his arms, the faint trail of hair across his stomach that made her rethink every opinion she’d ever had about body hair. She noticed things she somehow never had before. The small dimples at the base of his back. The way his body looked lived-in rather than sculpted for display.

She’d slept in the same room as him for months. She had seen this body before. She had simply never looked at it properly.

Is this… allowed? Is this mine? Temporarily? Emotionally? Legally? She had no idea.

Julian waved a hand in front of her face. “Elena.”

She blinked, swallowed, forced her mouth to cooperate. “Hi.”

“What happened to you?” he asked, stepping aside to let her in.

“Uh,” Ellie said, pulling herself together by sheer will. “I’m free. Thought I’d come by and spend time here. If that’s okay.”

“Of course,” Julian said, as if it had never been a question. “I already activated your keycard by the way. You can come in anytime I’m not around.”

“And steal groceries?” she asked, because jokes were safer than admitting she had just mentally catalogued his back.

“It’s not stealing if it’s yours.”

Yours.

Ellie followed him inside, heart doing something loud and inconvenient.

Julian checked his phone. “I have a few meetings this morning. I’ll be free after. What do you want to do?”

She smiled, dropping onto the couch. “Nothing. I just want to sit here and watch you be Julian the executioner.”

He looked at her, unimpressed. “There’s food in the kitchen. Make yourself comfortable.”

She nodded, suddenly aware of how easy this felt. How natural. Which was a problem.

“And Elena?”

“Yeah?”

“You can bring clothes next time.”

Ellie laughed, heat creeping up her neck. Right. Clothes. She was definitely not thinking about those dimples again. Not at all.

---

Ellie lay sprawled across the couch, phone hovering inches from her face, pretending to scroll while only catching every third word Julian said.

Something about budgets. Something about timelines. Something about people being wrong and him being right.

He was irritated. Focused, jaw tight, voice low and clipped in that way that suggested someone on the other end was seconds away from regretting their life choices.

Ellie glanced up. Watched the way his shoulders moved when he argued, restrained but sharp.

Why is this doing something for me?

She knew better than to interrupt him. He would snap. Still, the thought crossed her mind anyway.

What would happen if she did? What would that look be? The one he got when he was annoyed but trying not to show it.

She smiled to herself and slid off the couch.

The bed area was only half-separated from the rest of the apartment. Ellie padded across the floor, timing it so she moved just as he wrapped up one call and immediately clicked into another.

When he paused to adjust his laptop, she cleared her throat.

“Mind if I borrow one of your shirts?” she asked, breezy. “I spilled something on mine.”

He didn’t look away from the screen. “Go ahead.”

And just like that, he was back to being important.

Ellie headed for his closet. It was very…Julian. Organized in that meticulous way that made her feel both impressed and vaguely judged. She reached for a white button-down, soft and probably expensive, and held it up to herself.

Sure.

She slipped into the bathroom, shut the door, and took a breath.

Ellie, what are you doing?

Annoying him. That was the plan. Definitely just that.

She removed his tshirt and pulled the shirt on, sleeves swallowing her hands, hem brushing mid-thigh. Her pants came off easily, tossed over the counter. Bare feet on cool tile. She looked at herself in the mirror and raised an eyebrow.

This might be reckless.

She opened the door and walked back out.

Julian was seated at the table, laptop open, camera angled just right. She made sure to stay out of frame, drifting across his line of sight instead. Slow enough to be noticed. Casual enough to pretend it wasn’t intentional.

She felt his eyes flick up.

Pause.

Then back to the screen.

Ellie kept walking, heart thudding a little too loudly, lips pressed together to keep from smiling.

Mission accomplished.

---

The meeting should have ended five minutes ago.

Julian knew this because the agenda had ended five minutes ago, the action items were clear, and the person currently speaking had been repeating himself with new adjectives. He kept his face neutral, voice clipped, attention divided between the screen and the very real problem moving through his apartment.

Ellie crossed his line of sight in his shirt.

He did not look at her. He absolutely did not. He stared at the spreadsheet on his laptop and nodded at the appropriate intervals, said “we’ll circle back” once, and resisted the urge to end the call by force.

This was deliberate. He knew that much.

Ellie did not wander. She staged herself. Bare legs tucked under her, his white shirt hanging off her shoulders, fabric riding high on her thighs. She lounged on his couch as if she had not just detonated every last ounce of his concentration.

This is a dangerous game, he thought calmly, while something south of his belt had very different opinions.

He finished the call, closed the laptop, and set it aside with care. Then he walked over.

Ellie looked up at him, eyes bright, expression innocent in a way that fooled no one. “What?” she asked.

“What are you doing?” he said, tone even.

“Nothing?” she offered, smile widening.

He did not answer her. He leaned down instead, catching her wrists and pinning them gently but decisively against the couch cushions. Ellie laughed, breathless and surprised, the sound going straight through him.

“You think you’re clever,” he said.

“I’m not,” she said, still laughing, cheeks flushed.

He kissed her.

The kind of kiss that had been building through restraint and irritation and far too many meetings. Her laughter dissolved into a soft sound against his mouth, her hands slipping free to clutch at his shoulders.

---

She was smiling into it, lips tugging upward even as he pinned her back against the couch, his weight settling over her in a way that felt intentional and warm and very distracting. The world narrowed fast. Couch. Shirt. Julian. That was it.

He kissed her harder, slower somehow, as if he had all the time in the world and none at the same time. Ellie’s thoughts scattered immediately. Something about this was different. Hungrier. Less careful. She felt his mouth open, felt his tongue slide against hers, felt teeth graze her lip just enough to make her inhale sharply.

Her brain tried to keep up and failed. She was very aware of where she ended and where he began. His hands braced on either side of her. The heat of him. The pressure. The fact that she was still wearing his shirt and nothing else that mattered.

Julian broke the kiss just to drag his mouth down her jaw, then her neck. Ellie tilted her head without thinking, giving him access she did not remember granting. When his lips found the sensitive spot under her ear, she sighed.

Julian muttered something under his breath.

He shifted, pulling one of her legs higher, fitting himself closer between her thighs. Ellie’s brain fully checked out at that point. She felt his hand slide along her side, fingers spreading, grounding her. Then his hand was at her waist. Then higher. Then his thumb brushed her jaw, tilting her face back toward his.

She barely registered the way his other hand moved until it slipped under the hem of the shirt.

Her breath hitched so hard it surprised her. Every sensation felt amplified, unfamiliar, electric. His hand was warm, confident, and when it brushed her skin she almost laughed from the shock of how intense it felt. When his palm settled against her breast, she went very still.

This is happening, her brain said calmly, while the rest of her absolutely lost it.

She made a sound she did not know she could make. Julian froze for half a second, then his mouth was back on hers, deeper now, his kiss turning slow and unreasonably distracting. Ellie’s hands came up without permission, gripping his shoulders, then his shirt, needing something to hold onto.

Everything felt too much and not enough at the same time. Her heart was racing. Her skin felt too tight. She had no reference point for any of this and that somehow made it worse and better all at once.

Then a phone started ringing.

Ellie ignored it. Julian ignored it. The phone kept ringing.

Julian finally groaned and dropped his forehead against her shoulder, his breath hot against her neck. “I should quit my job,” he said into her skin.

Ellie laughed, a little breathless, a little frustrated, entirely amused. She slid her hand into his hair and squeezed. “We have lots of time.”

Julian lifted his head just enough to look at her, eyes dark, expression torn between restraint and something much less responsible.

The phone kept ringing.

Ellie smiled anyway.

Chapter 36: Fog

Ellie had planned to spend her day off doing nothing productive and everything indulgent. That meant cereal for lunch, no bra, and a long argument with herself about whether watching reruns counted as rest.

Then the mail came.

She stood by the door, flipping through envelopes, bills, flyers she did not ask for, until she saw the official-looking one.

She opened it anyway and saw that their divorce is already finalized.

That was it.

“Oh,” Ellie said to the empty living room, because apparently she needed an audience for this.

She sat down on the couch and read it again, slower, as if the words might rearrange themselves into something else. They did not. The marriage was over. Properly. Legally. No footnotes. No asterisks.

She exhaled and leaned her head back against the cushion.

The thing was, she had not expected it to feel like this.

Julian was still very much in her life. Every weekend, without fail. He cooked for her. Actual meals, not sad bachelor food. He listened when she talked about work, even when she was just venting about lighting cues and impossible directors. They kissed. A lot. Enough that her brain frequently goes haywire and forgot its own name.

But that was it.

No sex yet. And honestly, sex was not even the problem.

It was the fog.

The constant, low-level confusion. The way nothing had a label anymore. Before, at least, there was a structure. Fake, yes, but solid. She had been his wife. Legally. Technically. Defensively.

Now what was she?

A situationship felt too modern. Make-out buddy sounded like something a teenager would say. Whatever they were, it did not come with instructions, and Ellie hated not knowing the rules.

She picked up her phone and called Julian.

It headed straight to voicemail.

Of course.

He was always busy. She knew that. She understood it. She told herself she understood it daily, sometimes hourly. HaleCare was a mess. He was carrying it on his back with sheer force of will.

He always made it up to her. He showed up. He tried.

Still, she could not shake the feeling that she was always the one reaching. Always the one waiting for the next opening in his schedule, the next sliver of time he could spare.

It made her feel smaller than she liked.

Maybe it just was not the right time. Maybe she was asking for something he could not give right now. She hated that thought, hated how reasonable it sounded.

“Okay,” she muttered. “One more try.”

She called again.

Still voicemail.

Ellie stared at the screen for a beat, then sighed and switched targets.

Seb picked up on the second ring.

“Hey, pretty,” he said, far too cheerful for someone who worked with Julian daily.

“Hi,” Ellie said. “Um. Is Julian in the office?”

“He just stepped out,” Seb replied. “It’s been a morning. He said he was grabbing lunch.”

Ellie frowned. “Julian? Grabbing lunch? I thought he had a lifelong commitment to delivery apps.”

Seb laughed. “He does. But even he needs to breathe.”

Something in his tone made her pause. “Everything okay?”

Seb hesitated, just a fraction. “He’s under a lot of pressure. Margaret won’t budge on layoffs, and the numbers are not great. He’s trying to figure out where to pull money from without setting the whole thing on fire.”

Ellie closed her eyes briefly.

“Do you know where he is right now?” she asked.

“He mentioned The Copper Finch,” Seb said. “Said he just needed thirty minutes.”

Ellie glanced at the clock. Then at her shoes by the door.

“You think I can still make it?”

“I think so,” Seb said. “He left five minutes ago.”

That was all she needed.

Ellie grabbed her bag and keys, and booked an Uber before her brain could talk her out of it.

---

Julian had left the building because if he stayed another ten minutes he was going to say something irreversible to someone who did not deserve it.

He was not hungry. He knew that because his stomach felt flat and irritated, not empty. Lunch was just an excuse to move his body somewhere else, to put physical distance between himself and the collection of problems that had piled up since eight that morning.

He checked his phone while waiting to cross the street.

Three missed calls from Ellie.

He did not ignore her. He corrected himself immediately. Ignoring implied intent. This was triage. He did not have the patience today to hear her voice and not let the edge bleed through. If he snapped at her, even slightly, he would spend the rest of the day hating himself for it.

The morning had been a disaster in small, grinding increments.

A meeting that should have taken fifteen minutes dragged past an hour because no one wanted to say the obvious thing. HaleCare could not keep everyone. Margaret’s refusal to let people go was bleeding them dry, and the numbers were now loud enough that even denial had started to sound ridiculous. Vendors were circling. One of the hospitals had delayed payments again. Someone had suggested a “temporary workaround” that involved borrowing from a reserve fund that was already spoken for.

Every solution involved someone getting hurt. Every delay made it worse. He was holding the structure together with planning, pressure, and the quiet understanding that if it collapsed, it would do so on his watch.

So yes, he was done. And no, he could not drop it. That was the problem.

He was a block away from Copper Finch when his phone rang again and saw it was Candice.

He considered letting it go. He did not have the bandwidth for past lives today. But Candice never called casually. She texted for birthdays. She emailed for logistics. Calls meant emergencies or humiliation-level favors.

“Candice,” he answered.

“Julian,” she said. Her voice was tight. “I need to talk to you.”

“About what?”

“It’s better if I say it in person. Can we meet?”

He glanced at the restaurant ahead of him. “I’m at Copper Finch.”

“Great. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

Twelve minutes later, Candice slid into the chair across from him.

“I don’t know who else to turn to,” she said immediately. “Believe me, you are the last person I’d ask.”

Julian’s mouth twitched despite himself. “Somehow, I believe that.”

She huffed a short laugh, then sobered. She told him about the fire first. Her parents’ house, gone overnight. Then the insurance, or rather the absence of it. They had stopped paying years ago and never told her. She had drained what little savings she had getting them settled somewhere temporary. Credit cards were maxed. Student loans still very much alive. A doctor’s salary only stretched so far when it was supporting more than one generation.

“I’m not asking you to fix it,” she said quickly. “I just… need a bridge. I hate that I’m even saying this.”

Julian listened without interrupting. He noticed what she did not say. She did not ask him for money outright. She did not frame it as entitlement. When they divorced, she had walked away with exactly what was agreed upon and nothing more.

“How much do you need?” he asked.

“Not much,” Candice said, immediately downplaying it. “Just enough to get me through this month.”

He nodded once. “I’ll ask Seb to wire it today.”

She blinked. “Julian, I…”

“You’ll pay me back when you can,” he said. “Or you won’t. It’s fine. Just deal with what you need to deal with.”

Candice exhaled, something loosening in her shoulders. “Thank you. Really.”

She reached across the table and covered his hand with hers, a brief, grateful squeeze.

Julian let it happen. He registered the contact, the familiarity, the absence of anything complicated underneath it.

---

Ellie walked into the restaurant smiling. Busy or not, Julian always made space for her. Even when he was distracted, even when he was quiet, he still let her exist beside him. That had been the constant for almost a year, and she trusted it enough to walk in without hesitation.

She found him easily.

Julian sat near the window, jacket slung over the chair, posture attentive in that focused way he slipped into without effort.

Then her gaze slid sideways to Candice.

Ellie registered her in pieces. Too close. Too comfortable. The angle of her body turned inward, the way people lean when they expect to be heard. And then Ellie saw their hands on the table.

Candice’s fingers rested over Julian’s, casual and unguarded.

Something in Ellie’s chest collapsed inward.

So that’s why.

Her smile stayed in place, frozen and humiliating. She could feel it pulling at her cheeks, absurd and misplaced. Of course this was happening. His silence had an explanation that made sense now. The missing replies. The careful distance. The refusal to call whatever they were anything solid.

Clean slate. Take it slow. Get to know me first.

She’d built a whole structure around those words. Turns out it had no walls.

Maybe he was easing back into something familiar. Maybe he was waiting for the paperwork to clear. Or maybe she had simply mistaken access for intimacy and filled in the rest because she wanted to.

Julian looked up.

“Elena.”

No hesitation or flicker of discomfort. Just her name, spoken easily, as if this moment didn’t require adjustment.

That stung worse than if he’d looked guilty.

He stood immediately, already closing the distance between them.

Ellie’s throat tightened. The urge to say something flared hot and reckless. Ask him what this was. Ask him where she fit. Ask him why she was standing here feeling small while everyone else seemed to know the rules.

And then she remembered.

She had never been promised anything.

She inhaled, slow and shallow, and turned around.

By the time Julian reached the edge of the table, Ellie was already walking toward the door. Her steps stayed steady, her spine straight, dignity held together by muscle memory alone.

She didn’t look back.

She refused to give the room that satisfaction.

Chapter 37: Misunderstanding and Guilt

Julian hit the sidewalk at a pace that would have annoyed him under any other circumstance.

“Elena!”

His voice cut through the afternoon but she kept moving. People turned to look. He didn’t care. Public embarrassment ranked low today, somewhere beneath missed calls and catastrophic misunderstandings.

Because that’s what this was. A misunderstanding. A spectacularly poorly timed, badly framed misunderstanding.

He replayed the moment at the restaurant in real time as he jogged. The look on her face when she saw Candice. The way her expression froze for half a second before she shut it down and walked out. No pause. No confrontation. Just a clean exit.

She had drawn the wrong conclusion and he should have seen it coming. Candice’s hand on his. The timing. The silence earlier. The divorce papers finalized that morning. Put that together and the story wrote itself.

Julian hated stories he didn’t get to edit.

“Elena, wait.”

She didn’t.

She slipped into a cab, door already closing by the time he reached the curb. He caught a glimpse of her profile through the window, she never looked at him.

The cab pulled away.

Julian stood there, breathing hard, hand still half-raised, watching the taillights merge into traffic. He pulled out his phone immediately.

Straight to voicemail.

He tried again. Same result.

He swore under his breath, turning once in a tight circle, scanning the street as if she might reappear. His car sat two blocks away. He could make it. He could follow. He could fix this before it calcified into something worse.

His phone buzzed.

Seb.

Julian answered without greeting. “What.”

Seb didn’t bother softening it. “We have a problem. HaleCare just lost the Eastside clinic contract. Payroll’s exposed. Vendors are calling. Margaret’s in a meeting and refuses to cancel.”

Julian closed his eyes.

The timing would have been funny if it weren’t so on brand it felt targeted.

“Give me thirty minutes,” he said automatically.

“We don’t even have ten.”

Julian looked down the street again, long after the cab was gone. Ellie was already halfway home, already replaying the scene. He knew how her mind worked. She filled in silence fast. She didn’t wait for clarification.

And this was on him.

He had built a system that worked for him. Minimal explanations. Deferred conversations. Assumptions that things could be handled later.

Later had just left in a cab.

Julian exhaled through his nose, jaw tight. He turned back toward the office, steps heavy now, phone still in his hand.

“Loop me in,” he said to Seb. “I’m coming in.”

The rest could wait.

Except it couldn’t.

And that realization followed him all the way back to work.

---

The weeks blurred into a single extended headache.

Julian spent most of it arguing with people who refused to hear him and chasing numbers that refused to behave. HaleCare was bleeding in quiet, irritating ways. Contracts stalled. Vendors grew bold. Margaret remained immovable, as if sheer will could substitute for cash flow. Every conversation with her ended the same way, with Julian clenching his jaw and reminding himself that yelling at an elderly woman with impeccable timing would not solve anything.

Ellie, meanwhile, had vanished.

Blocked. Phone. Texts. Socials. Even the email he sent, which he hated on principle, came back unanswered. He reread it once, then never again. It sounded stiff. It sounded defensive. It sounded exactly like something written by a man trying to explain himself without admitting fault.

She had left him no better option and he resented that more than he should have.

Seb bore the brunt of it.

“I already told you,” Julian snapped one afternoon, fingers drumming against his desk, “we cannot afford another delay. Call them back and make it clear this is their last extension.”

Seb blinked at him slowly.

Julian exhaled, “I’m sorry. That was unnecessary.” He stopped himself. “That was unhelpful. I’m just…”

Seb leaned against the doorframe, unbothered.

“Julian,” Seb said lightly, “we’ve worked together for ten years. You could snap at me daily and I’d still show up. You’d have to do a lot worse to scare me off.”

“That’s comforting,” Julian muttered.

Seb smiled. “You could try the bend and snap.”

Julian looked up. “What?”

“Never mind. Pop culture. You’re stressed.”

“That is an understatement.”

Meanwhile, Ellie remained unreachable.

He tried their place again. Sometimes she’s not home. Sometimes Ethan answered, arms crossed, expression tight. The message was clear even without words. Julian didn’t push. He wasn’t afraid of Ethan. He just knew when pushing would make things worse.

He tried her work once. Waited outside longer than he cared to admit. A call came in twenty minutes before she got out. HaleCare again. Always HaleCare. He left before she appeared, driving away mid-thought with the familiar, bitter sense that timing had once again betrayed him.

At some point, he started to feel mocked by it.

The nights were worse.

Sleep came in fragments or not at all. His brain refused to shut up, replaying conversations that hadn’t happened and scenes that had gone wrong. Some nights he gave up and poured a drink, then another, just enough to dull the edges so his thoughts slowed to something manageable.

He didn’t enjoy drinking alone. That should have bothered him more than it did.

There were moments, rare and quiet, when he considered walking away from everything. Selling what he could. Letting HaleCare collapse under someone else’s watch. Finding a beach with terrible Wi-Fi and no expectations.

Then his phone would buzz. Another fire. Another meeting. Another reminder that walking away was a fantasy reserved for people without obligations.

Ellie stayed silent.

Julian kept going.

He told himself this was temporary. He told himself things could still be fixed. He told himself a lot of things, most of them while staring at the ceiling at three in the morning, wide awake, jaw tight, mind running in circles.

It had been hell.

And he was still standing in it.

---

Ellie read Julian’s message three times.

Once standing in the kitchen. Once sitting on the couch. Once lying on her bed, phone hovering above her face in a way that felt dramatic even to her.

He said she misinterpreted things. He said he hadn’t planned to meet Candice. He said she needed help and that was it. Full stop. End of explanation. Very Julian. Efficient. Defensive in that clipped, orderly way that made her want to argue and apologize at the same time.

She stared at the screen.

Of course people went to Julian when they needed help. That was the problem. That had always been the problem. He walked around pretending to be made of steel and spreadsheets, but the second someone he cared about looked even mildly desperate, he folded. She knew that. She had benefited from that. Repeatedly.

Which meant there was a very real chance she’d been wrong.

That realization landed badly.

What hurt wasn’t even seeing him with Candice anymore. That sting had dulled into something quieter and meaner. What hurt was realizing she didn’t know if she was allowed to be upset. Hurt with no permission felt worse. Hurt without a clean villain felt embarrassing.

So what were those days of silence then? The missed calls. The unanswered messages. The way she’d felt herself shrinking, trying to give him space while quietly panicking that she’d already fallen off his priority list.

Did helping Candice explain that? Maybe. Did it excuse all of it? She didn’t know. Her brain kept offering counterarguments and then immediately undercutting them. A debate club entirely staffed by her worst instincts.

That night, Ethan knocked on her door without waiting for permission.

“He was here again,” he said, leaning against the frame. “This is day…six? Seven? I’m starting to feel bad for him, and I hate it.”

Ellie kept scrolling, thumb moving without absorbing anything.

“What did he say?” she asked.

“He won’t tell me,” Ethan said. “Just that he needs to talk to you.”

She nodded, eyes still glued to her phone, as if Instagram had suddenly become urgent work.

Ethan crossed his arms. “I don’t know what’s going on, and I’m trying very hard to stay out of it. You know I’d prefer you forget him entirely. That’s my brotherly bias talking. But at least tell him to fuck off so he stops haunting our front porch.”

Her thumb froze.

Could she even do that? Tell Julian to stay away. Tell him she didn’t want to talk. That she was done. It sounded decisive in theory and impossible in practice.

Ethan sighed. “But if you want him, I’ll support you. Just don’t do this halfway thing. It’s cruel.”

That one hit too cleanly.

Ellie finally looked up.

The truth was, she didn’t know how to face Julian now. Not after storming out. Not after blocking him everywhere. Not after reading that message and realizing there was a non-zero chance she’d misread the whole situation and reacted like a woman who tripped over her own pride and took everyone down with her.

How did you show up after that? How did you say, ‘surprise! I might be wrong, please don’t look too closely at how confident I was about being right’.

She hated that this was about her ego. She hated that she knew it.

“Yeah,” she said finally. “I got it.”

Ethan studied her for a moment, then nodded and walked away.

Ellie stared back at her phone.

Julian’s message was still there.

Unread in her heart. Fully read in her head.

---

The following week, Ellie learned exactly how fast she could move when properly motivated.

Julian waited for her outside the theatre. She clocked him immediately and pivoted so hard she nearly walked into a trash can. She slipped behind a group of workmates she barely spoke to, nodded too much, laughed at nothing, and pretended she had always been a group person. She was not. She hated groups. Today, she loved them.

It worked. Twice.

On the third day, it did not.

She came out later than usual, bag slung over her shoulder, phone already in her hand, Uber app open before she even cleared the door. And there he was, closer this time, blocking the natural escape route with his entire inconvenient existence.

Great.

Up close, she noticed the lines at the corner of his eyes, the slight slump in his shoulders. He looked exhausted. That should have softened her. It almost did.

“Have you read my messages?” he asked.

“No,” she said, thumb hovering over her screen as if the Uber might materialize faster out of fear.

“Can we talk?”

“Aren’t you busy?” She finally looked up at him, challenge baked right into the question.

“Ellie, at least let me explain.”

“Okay,” she said, breath sharp. “So tell me. What are we? I’m not your wife. I’m not your girlfriend. I’m not even a fuck buddy.”

“Ellie…”

“It’s humiliating,” she went on, words spilling now that she’d cracked the seal, “to feel that angry when I don’t even know if I’m allowed to feel it. And I believe you. I do. I know it was nothing. But that makes it worse because then I’m just standing here feeling stupid for reacting at all.”

He watched her, jaw tight, saying nothing.

“And I know you have a million things going on,” she continued. “You don’t even tell me any of it. You disappear when things are bad. You show up when things are good. I don’t want to wait around until you feel better before you remember I exist. What does that make me?”

His phone buzzed.

He ignored it.

It buzzed again.

Julian exhaled and closed his eyes for a second, the way he did when everything pulled at him at once.

“Deal with it,” she said quietly. “I’m done playing this game.”

Her Uber rolled up right on cue. She opened the door without waiting for him to respond, slid inside, and shut it behind her.

The second the car pulled away, she pressed her forehead against the window and cried.

“What am I even doing,” she whispered to herself.

Chapter 38: We’re Back

Ellie learned very quickly that silence could be loud.

Julian stopped reaching out after that afternoon outside the theatre, and she told herself it was fine. Healthy, even. She focused on work, stayed late, reorganized props that did not need reorganizing, said yes to drinks she did not want. At night, though, she lay on her bed with her phone balanced on her stomach, thumb hovering over his name.

What would she even say?

Hey, I changed my mind felt pathetic.

Hey, sorry I snapped at you felt dishonest.

Hey, please don’t disappear when things get hard felt like begging.

She rolled onto her side and stared at the wall.

Boundaries, she reminded herself. Boundaries were good. Boundaries meant self respect. Boundaries meant she was not chasing someone who could not meet her halfway.

So why did she hate every second of it?

Her phone buzzed, startling her enough that she nearly dropped it on her face. Seb’s name flashed across the screen.

Watch the news.

She frowned and typed back.

What channel?

Any.

That did not help her anxiety at all.

Ellie padded to the living room, turned on the TV, and barely had time to process the anchor’s serious tone before Julian’s face filled the screen. Not a flattering photo. Tired. Jaw set. The kind of image people used when they wanted to sell panic.

The headline crawled across the bottom.

HALECARE UNDER FIRE AS FRAUD ALLEGATIONS ROCK BOARD

She sank onto the couch.

Apparently, a senior board member had been falsifying financial reports for years. Investors were pulling out. Beneficiaries were panicking. The word “misrepresentation” got thrown around a lot, followed closely by “oversight” and “accountability.” Julian Hale, newly appointed CEO, was being named in the same breath as if he personally forged the documents with a villain laugh.

Ellie’s chest tightened.

Of course they were blaming him. He had inherited the mess, which apparently made him responsible for cleaning it up while everyone stood around pointing.

She grabbed her phone and called him.

Straight to voicemail.

She tried again. Same result.

Her fingers moved on instinct as she dialed Seb.

“He’s at his apartment,” Seb said the second he picked up, voice sharp and already tired. “Phone’s off. He’s been there since this broke.”

“Thanks,” Ellie said, already pulling on her shoes.

She hung up, grabbed her coat, and flagged down the first cab that she saw. As she slid into the backseat, one thought kept circling her head, loud and insistent.

She could be wrong about a lot of things.

But she knew what Julian looked like when he carried everything alone.

---

Ellie let herself in quietly, the soft beep of the keycard sounding too loud in the dark apartment.

The lights were off. The city outside did most of the work, a dull glow leaking through the windows. She followed it toward the bedroom, heart doing that annoying fast thing it did when she was about to see him in a state he usually kept hidden.

Julian was sitting on the edge of the bed, shoulders rounded forward. One hand held a glass of whiskey, the other pressed to his forehead, elbow braced on his knee. His head was bowed, resting into his palm, hair mussed in a way she rarely saw. He looked smaller like this. Not weak. Just worn down.

Ellie stepped closer and gently took the glass from his hand. He startled, a sharp inhale, eyes lifting in confusion before landing on her. Recognition followed, slow and heavy.

She set the glass on the nightstand and wrapped her arms around his head, fingers sliding into his hair without thinking about it. The motion felt instinctive, automatic, the way her body moved before her brain could argue.

Julian’s arms came around her waist immediately, pulling her in as if he had been waiting for permission. His forehead pressed into her stomach. He let out a breath that sounded stuck in his chest.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

She did not answer. Words felt too blunt for the moment. Instead, she leaned down and kissed the top of his head, soft and careful.

His grip tightened. When he spoke again, his voice cracked just enough to make her throat ache.

“I’m tired.”

They stayed that way for a long time. Ellie counted his breaths without meaning to, felt the tension ease from his shoulders bit by bit. This was Julian without the armor. No explanations. No fixes. Just weight and exhaustion and the quiet trust of letting someone see it.

Her thoughts did not stay quiet, though.

She had stayed away to protect herself, told herself it was dignity, told herself it was boundaries. Standing here now, it felt selfish. He had been drowning and she had been arguing with herself about pride.

She also knew she could not keep waiting for him to say everything first. If she wanted clarity, if she wanted him, she had to step forward too. The idea terrified her. If he hesitated, she would feel it in places she did not know how to repair.

Then again, what was love if not choosing to risk that?

Ellie rested her cheek against his hair and finally spoke.

“I’m sorry too.”

---

They ended up sitting on Julian’s bed, side by side, knees touching. His hand wrapped around hers, warm and steady, thumb brushing slow circles over her knuckles as if that motion alone could keep the room from tilting.

Ellie watched his hand for a second longer than necessary. This was not the right time to define anything. He was exhausted. His world was on fire. But if she could lift even one weight off his shoulders, she wanted it to be this one.

She cleared her throat first.

“I know what you said about Candice was true,” Ellie said. “And I know you meant it when you said you wanted to start over.” She huffed a small laugh, shaking her head. “Still, when I saw you two together, I got jealous. Then immediately embarrassed about being jealous at all. Very Elena Bennett.”

Julian’s thumb paused, then resumed, slower now.

“When we were married,” she continued, “I could tell myself I was your wife. I had a label. Something solid. I could confront you without feeling ridiculous.” She glanced at him, then back at their hands. “When we filed for divorce, I kept waiting for you to tell me what we were instead. You did not. I tried to be understanding. You had a thousand things going on. You disappear when things get bad. I know that now.”

Her voice softened. “The day the divorce was finalized, I did not feel relieved. I felt…untethered. I went from being something to being nothing. And part of that is on me, because I waited instead of asking outright.”

Julian exhaled, long and tired.

“The thing is,” he said quietly, “you did ask. More than once. I kept pushing it off.” He looked down, jaw tight. “This fell apart because of me. I was not honest, because I was scared you would see me differently.”

Ellie stayed still, listening.

“I let myself be the guy who fixes things,” he went on. “The one who always has it together. If I let you in fully, you would see the version of me who fails. The one people eventually leave.” He swallowed. “I am not hesitant because I do not trust you. I am hesitant because I do not trust myself when things stop being controlled. I did not want you seeing that and deciding you made a mistake. Everyone else did.”

Ellie’s chest tightened, sharp and aching.

So this was it. This was Julian without the scaffolding. Not impressive, not composed. Just scared.

“I really want to be with you, Ellie,” he said. “I just do not know if I can survive another loss. And somehow, look where we are anyway.”

She turned toward him fully then, studying his face. The dark circles. The strain he never talked about. How exposed he was right now, sitting there saying all the things he usually buried under logic and timing.

Ellie reached up and cupped his jaw, thumb brushing along the edge where tension always lived.

“I want to be with you too,” she said. “But I want all of you. The messy parts. The parts that scare you. Do not protect me from that. I am not asking for perfect. I am asking to stand next to you when things are hard. I want to be your partner, not someone you manage or shield.”

Julian’s eyes softened. He nodded once, then smiled, small and real.

“I love you, Ellie.”

Her smile came easily this time. She leaned in and kissed him, slow and certain. When she pulled back, she was still smiling.

“So,” she said, “we are back.”

“Yes,” Julian said, his voice lighter now. He kissed her again, deeper this time. “We are.”

Chapter 39: Surrender

Julian’s kiss didn’t rush. It deepened in that deliberate way of his, the kind that made Ellie forget where her hands were supposed to go. She felt his palms settle against her back, broad and warm, steadying her as if he was anchoring her in place instead of pulling her under.

He pulled back just enough to look at her, eyes dark, intent, searching her face as if checking whether she was still there with him. His thumb brushed her cheek, pushing a strand of hair away, and then he kissed her again, slower this time, more certain.

When she felt his tongue against hers, something in her loosened. She made a soft sound and shifted instinctively closer, climbing into his lap without fully deciding to. Her hand slid into his hair, fingers curling there, testing how much she could hold him.

Julian cursed quietly, the sound low and wrecked, and his grip tightened. Her movement pressed them closer and the reaction was immediate, unmistakable. Ellie felt it through him and her breath stuttered, heat blooming fast.

He kissed her mouth again, then her jaw, then the soft place beneath her ear. His lips traced a path down her neck, unhurried, intentional, and she tilted her head without thinking, giving him access. Her pulse thudded hard where he kissed, every touch registering too loudly, too vividly.

His hands moved with care, sliding to her waist, thumbs brushing bare skin beneath the hem of her blouse. When he tugged it upward, he paused, eyes flicking to her face, waiting. Ellie nodded, barely breathing.

Julian pulled the blouse over her head slowly, as if committing every inch of her to memory. His gaze lingered, reverent in a way that made her chest tighten. When his mouth followed, warm against her skin, she gasped. His kiss over her breast was gentle, exploratory, his tongue a soft, teasing heat that sent a sharp shiver through her.

Ellie’s fingers tightened in his hair. She had no script for this. Every sensation felt new and overwhelming, her body responding faster than her thoughts ever could.

He lifted her with ease then, shifting them onto the bed, laying her back against the sheets while he hovered over her, bracing himself on his hands. He kissed her again, deeper now, mouths moving together in an unspoken rhythm, his weight a promise rather than a demand.

Ellie curled her legs around his hips, breathless and dizzy, entirely aware of him above her, around her, choosing patience even as his restraint thinned.

---

Julian was aware, distantly, that he could stop.

Ellie was beneath him, hair spread across the sheets, cheeks flushed, eyes too bright, and his brain kept tripping over that image instead of producing anything useful. He had seen her a thousand times. In oversized sweaters, in borrowed T shirts, laughing with her mouth full, pacing the apartment while on the phone. None of that prepared him for this version of her, open and trusting and watching him with an expression that made his chest tighten.

He traced a line down her side with his hand, slow enough to feel the shudder it pulled from her. He noticed everything. The way her breath hitched before his fingers even finished the movement. The way her body reacted before her mind caught up. He kissed where his hand had been, following the path deliberately, as if he was mapping her.

This was overdue. That realization landed clean and undeniable.

Ellie wrapped her legs around his thigh, instinctive and clumsy and entirely sincere, and Julian had to close his eyes for a second. He wanted to take this slowly. He meant to. He kept reminding himself that this was new for her, that rushing would steal something he didn’t want to take away. He wanted her present for every second of it.

But she made that difficult.

Every sigh from her mouth felt like a provocation. Every soft sound pressed him closer to the edge he was trying to stay away from. He adjusted his weight, grounding himself, kissed her again, slower, steadier, even as his restraint thinned.

Ellie fumbled with the buttons of her pants, fingers slipping, a breathless laugh breaking through.

“Give me a sec,” she said, amused and flustered. “This is…”

Julian smiled despite himself. “I’ve got it.”

He helped her, hands gentle, unhurried, easing the fabric away instead of letting her struggle through it. When he finished, he paused, taking her in properly this time. No rush. No distraction.

“You’re beautiful,” he said, quietly, as if stating a fact he had confirmed repeatedly.

She scoffed, heat rising in her cheeks. “You’re ridiculous.”

He kissed the inside of her knee, then higher along her thigh, slow and deliberate, his mouth learning the curve of her skin. Her breath caught again. He followed the reaction, not the plan, kissing where her body responded most, where she tensed and relaxed beneath him.

Julian stayed aware of himself even as he let go a little. Careful hands. Measured pace. Attention fixed entirely on her.

And still, with every sound she made, he knew exactly how close he was to losing that control.

---

Julian was between her legs and everything inside her had gone incandescent, every nerve suddenly loud and demanding attention all at once. Her hands were in his hair, fingers curling, tugging, holding on as if that was the only thing keeping her anchored to the bed. She didn’t know she could feel this much, didn’t know her body could build toward something so sharp and overwhelming.

Sounds were coming out of her mouth that she would absolutely pretend never happened. They weren’t words. They weren’t even thoughts. They were reactions, stripped down and unfiltered.

Her hips moved on instinct, chasing the sensation, and Julian’s hands held her steady, firm and grounding, keeping her right where she was as if he knew she’d float off otherwise.

“Julian…” she gasped, breath breaking, “I think I’m close.”

The word close barely made it out before everything tipped.

The sensation crashed over her all at once, dizzying and bright, her body tightening and releasing in waves. She shook through it, clinging to him, eyes squeezed shut, overwhelmed and exhilarated in equal measure. It felt endless. It felt impossible to come back down from. Part of her didn’t want to.

When she finally opened her eyes again, Julian was standing, pushing his sweatpants down, and her brain stalled completely.

Oh.

That was…a lot.

Her gaze flicked up, then back down, then immediately regretted all of her life choices that led her to saying the first thing that popped into her head.

“It’s mine?” she blurted, then cringed so hard she almost folded in on herself.

Julian smiled. He hovered back over her, familiar and solid and entirely too calm for someone who had just dismantled her.

“Yes,” he said

“Nice to know,” Ellie muttered, mortified and still very distracted.

He grew serious then, hands gentle as he settled closer. “I’ll take it slow. Tell me if you want me to stop.”

“I won’t,” she said immediately, without thinking.

Julian kissed her again, deep and steady, and when she felt him ease closer, she tensed despite herself. The first sensation was unfamiliar, a pressure that made her gasp, her body unsure, adjusting. He moved carefully, watching her face, giving her time.

It wasn’t painless, but it wasn’t frightening either. It was strange and intense and deeply intimate, every movement registering as something new. She clutched at his back, breath uneven, grounding herself in the feel of him there.

Then the discomfort softened, replaced by warmth, by a fullness that tipped into pleasure she hadn’t known she’d been missing. The realization hit her all at once and made her laugh softly into his shoulder.

“Oh,” she breathed. “Oh.”

Julian moved slowly, deliberately, every motion careful and attentive, and Ellie held on, body opening to the rhythm, to the closeness, to the way he stayed right there with her, as if nothing else existed beyond this moment.

---

Julian had every intention of pacing himself.

This was not a lie he was telling her. It was the plan. Slow entry. Monitor breathing. Watch her reactions. Do not rush. Do not be an idiot.

The problem was that plans tended to fail when confronted with reality.

Ellie was tense in that way that had nothing to do with fear and everything to do with anticipation. He felt it immediately. Too tight. Too aware. Too much.

He exhaled through his nose and adjusted, forcing himself to move carefully, deliberately, even as his focus narrowed while his control was slowly slipping.

He kissed her neck instead, grounding himself in something familiar. Her skin was warm. She smelled clean, unmistakably her. His mouth brushed just below her ear as he muttered, low and rough despite his best efforts, “You’re making it hard.”

That earned him a sharp intake of breath from her and then her hands tightened, nails digging into his shoulders.

That did it.

Whatever structure he had built cracked clean through.

Julian swore under his breath, his movements losing their careful edge, instinct overriding strategy. Her grip anchored him, her reactions immediate and unfiltered, and suddenly he was far less interested in restraint than he had been thirty seconds ago.

He pressed his forehead briefly to hers, a last, futile attempt at composure, then moved again, slower than he wanted, faster than he should, fully aware he was already past the point of no return.

So much for pacing.

---

Ellie lost track of when things tipped from controlled to completely unhinged in the best possible way.

One second Julian was visibly trying, to keep himself measured, and the next everything sped up. His grip tightened. He pulled her closer, and whatever restraint he had been clinging to dissolved without ceremony.

She felt it in the change of his breathing, the way his body shifted against hers, the way his mouth dropped into the curve of her neck as if he needed something solid to hold on to.

“Ellie,” he said against her skin, rough and strained. “You feel it?”

“Yes,” she gasped, the word tumbling out half-laughed, half-broken. “Oh my god, yes. Don’t stop.”

She was not scared. She was soaring. Everything felt louder, brighter, more urgent. Her hands clawed at his back, nails scraping because she needed an anchor and he was the only thing keeping her from floating off entirely.

Every movement knocked the air from her chest. Sounds kept spilling out of her mouth before she could stop them, sharp breaths and soft cries and something embarrassingly close to begging. She registered, distantly, that she was loud. That awareness lasted about half a second before it vanished again.

Her body tightened, sensation piling too fast to keep up with, heat curling low and insistent.

“Julian…” she managed, then lost the sentence completely.

Julian stayed with her, murmuring encouragement she barely heard, his voice steady even as everything else unraveled. “Let go,” he whispered, right when she needed it most.

She did.

The feeling hit her all at once, dizzying and overwhelming, stealing her breath and her grip on time. Julian followed her there, a strained sound leaving him as he pulled away just in time, the moment cresting hard and sudden for both of them.

Ellie lay there afterward, blinking at the ceiling, heart racing, limbs buzzing, entirely unsure if gravity still applied.

Julian pressed a kiss to her cheek, then her temple, his fingers brushing her face in a way that felt grounding and careful.

“You good?” he asked softly.

She turned her head toward him, still catching her breath. “That was…” She searched for a word, gave up immediately. “Can we do it again?”

His laugh was low and warm, unmistakably pleased. “Be careful what you wish for, Elena,” he said, already pulling her back against him.

“What?”

He answered by kissing her, unhurried this time, and the rest of the night blurred into heat and laughter and tangled limbs, the world narrowing down to just the two of them and the quiet certainty that neither of them was going anywhere.

Chapter 40: Marginally Survivable

Ellie woke up wrapped in sheets that definitely did not belong to her, very aware of two things right away.

One, she was naked. Very naked.

Two, Julian was already dressed.

She burrowed deeper into the bed, tugging the sheets up to her chin. From this angle she could see him moving around the bedroom, freshly shaved, hair styled, shirt crisp. It was unsettling how quickly he looked put together again, as if last night had been a dream she made up and he had simply slept eight responsible hours and gone on with his life.

He caught her staring and paused, then walked back and sat on the edge of the bed, his hand settling on her back in a slow, grounding sweep.

“You okay here?” he asked.

She nodded, voice still sleepy. “Yeah. Can I stay? I don’t have work today.”

“Of course,” Julian said easily.

She squinted up at him. “You okay?”

He raised a brow. “Define okay.”

“Do you want to escape and live in the mountains,” she clarified, “raise goats, refuse email, that sort of thing.”

He chuckled. “Believe me, I’ve considered it. But I’m better today than I was yesterday.”

“The offer stands,” Ellie said. “I’d be an excellent goat herder.”

Julian leaned down and kissed her, quick and warm. “I have to go. There’s food here, but if you want to order something…”

He reached into his jacket and handed her a black card.

Ellie stared at it, then at him. Her brain took a second to reboot. “I didn’t realize my performance last night came with compensation.”

He gave her a look.

“I’m kidding,” she said quickly, already taking the card anyway. “I think I’ll buy a car.”

“I have an extra one in Willowridge,” Julian said, entirely serious. “I can have it shipped.”

She laughed, loud and surprised, suddenly remembering how oddly economical he could be with everything except solutions. She loved that about him. It was ridiculous and endearing and very Julian.

“Hey,” he added, “it’s only five years old. It’s still good.”

“I was joking,” Ellie said.

“Let’s see if you can joke ater tonight,” he said, smirking as he leaned down to kiss her again.

He headed for the door, jacket already on, phone in hand.

“Hey,” Ellie called out, clutching the sheets around herself. “Mind if I bring lunch later?”

“Not at all.”

The door closed behind him.

Ellie immediately shoved her face into the pillow and let out a muffled shriek, limbs flailing once for emphasis before she collapsed back onto the bed, grinning at the ceiling and very briefly planning their entire future in a way she pretended she did not do.

She was still floating when reality tapped her on the shoulder.

Ethan.

She shot upright. “Oh shit.”

She grabbed her phone, typing furiously. Didn’t die. Slept somewhere else. Will explain. Love you.

She stared at the message, then added another. It’s not a cult.

She hit send and fell back onto the bed, laughing to herself, the black card glinting on the nightstand and Julian’s pillow still warm beside her.

---

Ellie made a pit stop at Ethan’s place first, because showing up to Julian’s office in last night’s clothes felt like tempting fate.

She let herself in, grabbed a few clothes then changed at record speed. Before leaving, she slapped a note on the fridge in aggressive handwriting.

Staying at Julian. I’m not kidnapped. Love you. Talk later. P.S. Please don’t get mad, Ethan. I love you.

She stared at it, added a heart for diplomacy, then bolted.

By the time she reached Julian’s office, she had a backpack slung over one shoulder and two lunch boxes in her hands.

Seb looked up from his desk and immediately lit up.

“Well,” he said brightly, eyes flicking to the lunch boxes. “Something happened.”

Ellie rolled her eyes, smiling despite herself. “Is Julian here?”

“He’s in a meeting,” Seb said. “Should be done soon. Or he’ll explode and end it early. Hard to say.”

Before Ellie could reply, raised voices drifted from the reception area. She turned to see a small crowd clustered near the front desk, faces tight with worry, hands gesturing, the receptionist trying valiantly to keep her voice calm while being emotionally bulldozed.

Seb sighed, long and theatrical. “Beneficiaries. They’ve been coming in waves.”

Ellie watched them, the way fear sat right under their anger. “They’re scared.”

“I know,” Seb said. “And I get it. But there’s nothing we can tell them yet. We’re just…waiting for Julian to pull off some miracle.”

Ellie’s stomach twisted. Waiting was the worst thing you could ask people to do when their future was wobbling.

“Can I talk to them?” she asked.

Seb blinked. “I’m not sure Julian would be thrilled about that. No offense, honey.”

“None taken,” Ellie said quickly. “I’m not planning to promise them the moon. Just…listen. Maybe calm things down enough so they don’t stage a coup in the lobby.”

Seb hesitated, weighing risks, glancing once toward the closed conference room door.

Finally, he exhaled. “Fine. I’ll come with you. It’s not that I don’t trust you. This is just wildly unplanned and I prefer chaos with witnesses.”

Ellie beamed. “Great. So what should I tell them?”

Seb gasped, hand flying to his chest.

Ellie winced. “Okay. Right. I’ll just… listen. Validate feelings. Nod sympathetically. I can do that.”

She straightened her shoulders, took a breath, and muttered under it, “You are emotionally competent. You are calm. You are not going to cry in front of strangers.”

Seb leaned in. “You ready?”

Ellie nodded, stepping forward with a smile that said I don’t have answers, but I do have ears and hoping very hard that would be enough.

---

Ellie stepped forward and immediately realized crowds did not respond to soft voices or polite hovering.

“Hi,” she tried anyway, lifting a hand.

Someone in the back squinted at her. “Are you lost?”

Another voice followed. “Sweetheart, this is a corporate office.”

A third added, generously, “She probably just wandered in.”

Ellie smiled, tight but friendly. “I did not wander in.”

That earned her a few blinks.

“You look twelve,” one woman said. “Are you an intern?”

Ellie glanced at Seb, who had gone very still beside her, then back at the group. “Okay. First of all, I am twenty-eight. Second, I’m not an executive. Third, I’m also a beneficiary.”

Seb coughed so hard it sounded like a medical emergency.

That got their attention.

Ellie took a breath and did the thing she was actually good at. She listened.

They talked over each other at first. About retirement plans. About spouses. About medical bills and tuition and timelines that suddenly felt fragile. Ellie nodded, asked questions, repeated things back to them so they knew she heard it correctly. She didn’t promise fixes. She didn’t throw out dates or numbers. She just made space and said, calmly, that the company knew the stakes and was working through them.

People relaxed in inches.

By the time she finished, the tension had softened into something quieter. Worry, still. But less sharp.

“That’s all we wanted,” one man said. “Someone to acknowledge it.”

“We’ll wait,” another added. “And pray he pulls it off.”

Someone else nodded solemnly. “He looks stressed enough to deserve divine intervention.”

Ellie followed their gazes.

Julian stood by the conference room door, jacket off, sleeves rolled up, watching her with an expression she couldn’t decode at all.

The group began to disperse, offering him nods and encouragement on their way out, one woman patting his arm and telling him she’d light a candle.

When the last of them left, Julian walked over slowly, eyes still on Ellie.

He looked confused. Impressed. Alarmed. Possibly all three.

Ellie lifted the lunch boxes slightly. “Hi,” she said. “Lunch?”

---

Ellie followed him into his office and closed the door behind her.

Julian turned around mid-thought, brain still buzzing from numbers and angry faces and whatever fresh disaster was waiting in his inbox, and then she was just…there.

“What did you just do,” he said, flatly.

She froze for half a second, then lifted her hands. “Okay. Nobody was promised anything, Seb was there, and your reception desk is still standing.”

He looked past her, half-expecting to see smoke or security guards or at least a broken plant. Everything was fine. Quiet, even.

Julian exhaled through his nose.

She moved to the side table, already unpacking the containers she’d brought, as if this were normal. As if she hadn’t just walked into a room full of angry people and somehow walked out with them calmer than before.

“You do realize,” he said, watching her, “you walked into a mess I’ve been avoiding all morning and made it smaller.”

She glanced over her shoulder. “I did?”

“Yes,” he said. “And I didn’t ask you to. Which is irritating.”

She turned fully now, brows raised. “That didn’t sound like a complaint.”

“It isn’t,” he said. He crossed the room before he could overthink it, reached for her wrist, and pulled her in.

Ellie startled, then laughed when he leaned his forehead against her shoulder.

“You’re a menace,” he muttered. “Do you know that.”

She slid her fingers into his hair. Julian closed his eyes.

“You look exhausted,” she said.

“I am,” he replied. “Margaret won’t budge. No layoffs. She thinks it builds character.”

“And does it.”

“It builds migraines,” he said. “If she weren’t my grandmother, I would’ve lost my temper an hour ago.”

She stayed there, fingers moving slowly through his hair, grounding him in a way he hated needing and loved having.

After a moment, she nudged him. “Let’s eat.”

“What did you make,” he asked, eyeing the containers.

“Mexican,” she said, then corrected, “Mexican-ish. I wanted to cook back in Willowridge, but your house staff acted like I was trying to overthrow the monarchy.”

“They take their jobs very seriously,” he said.

The food looked…suspicious. It had the energy of something thrown together at the last minute. Julian took a careful bite.

Then another.

Then he stopped pretending to be cautious.

Ellie watched him, smug. “Told you.”

He swallowed, stared at the food, then at her. The thought hit him fully formed and completely unhelpful.

He could marry her again for this alone.

“It’s fine,” he said, deadpan, reaching for more. “I suppose I can tolerate it.”

She laughed. “You’re lying.”

“I am,” he admitted. “Can I have more?”

“You can have mine.”

He took it without hesitation. Then, because apparently today was about honesty, he added, “For the record, what you did out there was impressive.”

Her smile softened, just a little.

Julian looked at her, and thought, not for the first time, that everything felt marginally survivable when she was in the room.