Chapter Seventeen #2
The way they looked at me then made my chest tighten—like I was back in that bedroom years ago, both of them looking up at me, waiting.
But I got it now.
They weren’t waiting for me to make things better.
They were waiting for me to stay.
I exhaled hard. “It’s—” My lips pressed together. “I can’t fix it. It fucking kills me that I can’t.”
Neither of them rushed to fill the silence.
Henry leaned forward first, forearms on the table. “What did Elena say?”
I dragged a hand down my face. “She wants to offset the loss through private sector contracts. Fast. Aggressive expansion.” My mouth twisted. “I’ve barely looked at them. I’ve been… focused on making it go away.”
Oliver nodded slowly, absorbing that. “Ash.”
I already knew that tone. I braced for it anyway.
“Why are you trying to do this by yourself?”
My spine stiffened. “I’m the one who—”
“You’re the one who cares the most,” Oliver corrected gently. “That’s not the same thing as being the only person responsible.”
“There are entire departments whose job it is to handle fallout like this,” Henry said. “You don’t get to martyr yourself just because you hate losing.”
“I’m not martyring—”
“You’re exhausted,” Oliver cut in, not unkindly. “You’re running on caffeine and stubbornness. That’s not strategy.”
My jaw tightened. They weren’t wrong. I hated that they weren’t wrong—and that it had taken me this long to listen.
“We can look at it together,” Oliver continued. “Loop in Elena. Finance. Marketing. Pivot the strategy—focus on private sector expansion for now. You don’t have to solve it in one sleepless night.”
My instinct was to refuse. To push back. To take it all back into my own hands where it belonged. But the pressure behind my eyes pulsed again, dull and relentless.
I couldn’t keep this up.
“We’ll figure it out,” Henry added. “Together. That’s what we do.”
I looked between them—really looked—and felt something give, just a little.
Before I could respond, Henry’s phone buzzed on the table.
He glanced down and pushed back his chair. “Vivian’s here. I’m being summoned.” He squeezed the back of my neck as he passed, a quick, grounding gesture. “Everything’s going to be okay, Ash.”
Then he was gone.
Oliver watched him disappear down the corridor before turning back to me, hand already reaching for his coffee.
My gaze drifted past him instead.
Ethan stood at the far end of the hall, leaning against the wall, one phone tucked between his ear and shoulder as he scrolled through files on another. Focused. Calm. Completely unbothered by the chaos around us.
Then, as if he felt my eyes on him, he looked up. Whatever was on my face must have given me away, because his expression softened immediately.
Oliver followed my line of sight, a small smile tugging at his mouth. “You’re different with him.”
“Am I?”
“It’s sweet,” he said, taking a sip. “I never really got to see you two together. I wasn’t expecting it to be like that.”
I tilted my head. “Like what?”
“You know.” He waved a hand, widening his eyes like that was supposed to explain anything. “I expected you to be all… Sebastian about it. And it’s not. Which is a good thing. I just didn’t know.”
If Oliver was fumbling for words, he’d definitely reached his limit.
“I don’t think you function as well as you think you do without sleep.”
He laughed, setting his coffee down. “You’re leaning on him. I’ve never seen you do that. With anybody.”
My lips parted.
“I figured you’d be all protective and authoritative,” he went on, “and you’re just…” He let the word hang.
“What?”
“Soft,” Oliver said. “You’re softer with him.”
Couldn’t argue with that. Ethan just brought it out of me. Yet another thing I couldn’t control around him—one I didn’t want to. Not anymore.
I hummed, and Oliver rolled his eyes, a hint of amusement there.
“It’s good that you feel safe with him, Ash,” he said. “It’s a really good thing.”
“If it works out,” I muttered.
“It will.” He smiled at me, the kind that didn’t leave room for debate.
“Maybe.”
Oliver stared into his coffee like it might hold answers, then let out a quiet chuckle that grew into a full laugh, the sound edged with exhaustion and disbelief.
I frowned. “You need to sleep.”
He nodded, wiping at the corner of his eye. “I do. But god—you do realize we’re going to have the same in-laws?”
“And that’s funny to you?”
“They don’t like you—at all.”
“I’ve assumed as much,” I said. “I’m not crazy about them either.”
He made a dismissive wave with his cup. “Margaret’s always been too preoccupied with what people think,” Oliver went on. “And just because he’s older, it doesn’t make the age gap disappear, you know?”
My stomach twisted, the guilt I’d carried about Ethan—and the disparity in our ages—surfacing all over again. “I know.”
“Do I think she’s aiming her anger at the wrong thing? Absolutely.” He shrugged. “But part of me gets why it bothers her so much. No one wants that for their kid. To watch them struggle like that.”
My brows drew together. “Because of how different our lives will be?”
“No. Because of how hard it was on Ethan.”
That caught me off guard. “When I left?”
“People were horrible to him. You know this,” he said casually, taking a sip of his coffee like he hadn’t just wrecked me with that single sentence.
“I—”
His eyes lifted to mine.
“I didn’t know that,” I said quietly.
Oliver’s expression fell. “I mean, Ash… what did you expect? That the scandal would just leave with you?”
Yes. That had been exactly what I’d thought. It sounded stupid hearing it out loud.
“How was he struggling?”
Oliver glanced at Ethan, now talking to Henry, the two of them smiling easily, before turning back to me. “He didn’t really have much of a life in college. As far as I know, he kept to himself. Mostly stayed at the house with us or went out with Henny—and even that was rarely in the city.”
Something tight closed around my ribs. I watched Ethan laugh at something Henry said, like the past Oliver was describing belonged to someone else entirely.
“His own family wasn’t talking to him,” he said. “Going to Madrid was the right call, I think. Not just for you two. He needed a fresh start. He needed his life back.”
Fuck.
And then he’d gotten there, and I’d been a complete asshole to him.
No wonder he’d been so angry.
I’d blown up his life and then hadn’t even had the decency to really see it. To see him. Or what I’d done. Or tell him how much he’d meant to me all along.
I’d been a fucking idiot.
“Hey,” Oliver said. “You’re working on it now, right? Making it better? That’s what matters.”
I nodded, but the knot in my chest stayed tight. It would stay there until I actually did something about it.
Ethan needed this. He needed me to be honest. To show up—the way he kept showing up for me. And I was fucking done half-assing things with him.
“I’ll make it better,” I said, my voice firmer this time.
Oliver smiled. “Exactly.” He shrugged, then looked away. “At least you don’t have to deal with his father anymore.”
Another sinking feeling settled low in my stomach. “Actually… we should probably talk about that.”
Oliver’s expression sobered instantly.
My eyes found Ethan one more time, lingering there a second longer before I leaned forward and laid it all out—the shit piling up in the background.