21. Parker
PARKER
I wake up with puffy eyes and a headache that feels like it’s coming from behind my ribs. Like grief, not dehydration.
My dress is draped over the chair by the window, still clinging to its shape from last night. The heels that carried me through a ballroom and a bombshell and a marble-floor mic drop are upside down on the rug. My clutch is empty. I don’t even remember setting it down.
I came home. That much I know. Slipped out while they were still arguing. Got in the rideshare. Told the driver to take the long way and cried the whole time into the satin shoulder strap of my bag.
I’m not mad at them. I’m mad at me. Because I did this.
I threw a live wire into the middle of their already impossible lives. I let things happen. I let myself want too much. Take too much. And now I’ve jeopardized everything they’ve worked for.
VT Global is their legacy. And I made it a ticking time bomb. They’ll never say it—Jack would grumble, Gavin would go silent, and Harrison would just look at me—but I know. I saw the pressure behind their eyes. The pain. They were already breaking apart before I left. I just…sped it up.
So I do the only thing I can. I fix it. Or at least, I try.
I sit on the couch with my laptop balanced on my knees, hair still damp from the shower I took to feel human again. My kids are at school. The house is quiet.
I open my email. The cursor blinks at me. I blink back, not sure what to say at first. But the words come eventually. I draft the whole thing twice before I get to something that feels like enough—but not too much.
Subject: Resignation – Parker Simon
To the Partners of VT Global,
Effective immediately, I am resigning from my role as executive assistant and event coordinator.
I want to thank you for the opportunity and for everything I’ve learned in my time with the firm. This was a difficult decision, but I believe it’s the right one—for me, and for the company.
Please consider this my formal notice. I will not be returning to the office. Please forward my belongings to the address on file with HR.
Wishing you continued success,
Parker Simon
I stare at it for ten minutes. Hover over the send button for five more. Then I click. The email vanishes.
And with it, the last thread tethering me to them. I close the laptop and pull my knees to my chest, wishing none of this had ever happened. I thought I’d feel better once the email was sent. I don’t. Instead, I feel hollow. Like something sacred has been carved out of me.
I don’t cry. I don’t move. I just sit on the couch, curled up with a blanket and a cup of chamomile I reheated twice and never drank. I let the silence stretch long enough to convince myself I made the right call. But my stomach twists every time I glance at my phone.
No reply. Not yet.
Eventually, I put the laptop away and pull myself together. Light makeup. Jeans and a soft sweater. Something cozy enough to pass as comfort, something clean enough to keep my mom from worrying. At least I pass for human again. Kind of.
My mom is upstairs, probably folding something or cleaning something or drinking tea while watching a courtroom show she comments on like she’s on the jury.
I should tell her. I should’ve told her days ago. But how do I explain this?
“Hi, Mom. Remember when you told me not to fall for three men at work who also happen to be Phil’s best friends and billionaires and—oops—I’m pregnant again, but this time I have no idea who the father is?”
Yeah. That’ll go over great.
The nausea hasn’t hit yet today, which is a small win. The queasiness is always worse when I’m anxious, but right now I’m past anxious. I’ve tipped into a numb, slow kind of dread. The kind I felt when I was just a kid—when I found out about Levi and Lyra.
That moment flashes through me like a movie I forgot I agreed to rewatch—kneeling on the bathroom floor of a cheap apartment, pregnancy test shaking in my hands, tears stinging before I even looked at the result.
Then the second line appeared. And just like that, my world split in half.
Now here I am again. Pregnant. Scared. Alone.
Only this time, it’s worse. Because this time, it wasn’t an accident in the dark with a man who couldn’t stay.
It was three men I knew. Three men I cared about.
Three men I trusted. Three men who made me believe, just for a second, that I was allowed to want everything.
And now? Now I’ve ruined it. Not them. Me.
I walk to the mirror in the hallway, half expecting to look different.
But I don’t. Still the same brown hair, the same tired eyes, the same lines around my mouth from smiling too much for everyone else’s comfort.
But something’s changing beneath the surface.
A heartbeat that isn’t mine. A consequence I can’t take back.
I need help. I’m not doing this on my own.
I knock gently on Mom’s door, and she answers it still wearing her reading glasses. “Hey, sweetheart,” she says. “Everything okay? Are the kids okay?”
I open my mouth. Then close it again.
She watches me for a second longer. “Parker.”
“I need to talk to you.”
“Of course.” She holds the door open wide, and I shuffle in. There’s another knitting project on the couch next to where she was sitting, so I take the other end of it. Without a word, she reaches over and takes my hand.
And suddenly I feel twelve again. Like I’m about to admit I cheated on a math test. But this is bigger.
This is everything. “I’m pregnant.”
Her hand tightens just a little. And she doesn’t say a word. Not yet. She just waits.
I half expect her to sigh. To take off her glasses and pinch the bridge of her nose like she used to when Phil and I would fight as teenagers. Maybe fold her arms. Maybe say something like Parker, I told you this would happen.
But she just squeezes my hand again and says, “You want to talk about it?”
My throat tightens. “Not really.”
“Okay.”
She waits. That’s what she does. She doesn’t prod or scold or guilt-trip. She just gives me space until I either fill it or start crying inside of it.
I exhale slowly. “It isn’t like last time.”
She nods.
“I mean, I wasn’t…alone. And I wasn’t being careless. I was on the pill. It wasn’t supposed to happen.”
She stays quiet.
I keep going. “I didn’t plan on any of it. Not the job. Not the gala. Not…them.”
Her brows lift slightly. “Them?”
I nod, blinking back tears. “It’s not just one guy this time.”
“I know.” She says it without judgment. Not even surprise. Just that soft sadness I hate—because it means she’s hurting for me.
I try to explain. “It wasn’t a game. It wasn’t like I walked in there planning to fall for my bosses. It just…happened. Slowly. Then all at once.”
She tilts her head, and her eyebrow jumps a little. “All at once? Together?”
“Yes.”
Her mouth twitches, like she’s trying not to smile. “Okay.”
I laugh. It’s small and watery, but seeing her try not to judge me is kinda funny.
“You want to tell me what happened?”
So I do.
I tell her about the first day, about seeing Jack again after all those years. About the elevator. About the way things spiraled. About the retreat. About the gala. About Vanessa. Vivian. Quitting.
She doesn’t interrupt. Just listens, occasionally nodding, occasionally humming in that way she does when she’s filing information in her brain.
When I finish, I feel wrung out. Empty and full all at once.
Her fingers are still laced with mine. “Okay,” she says finally. “That’s…a lot.”
“Yeah.”
She leans back, sighs through her nose.
“You’re not mad?” I ask.
“Oh, honey. I’ve been mad. Mostly at the idea of you being hurt again. But no, I’m not mad now.”
“But you warned me.”
“I did.”
“And I didn’t listen.”
“No, you didn’t.” She just shrugs it off, like she’s not disappointed in me.
“It’s not like last time. They know about the pregnancy. They said they want to handle it together?—”
She nods. “You mentioned that.”
“It’s just…everything else that got in the way.”
“Vivian.”
I nod.
“And fear,” she adds gently.
I blink. “What?”
“You left before they could leave you.”
“That’s not why… It’s not like I…” I go still. Because she’s not wrong. I swallow.
Her voice softens. “Do you love them?”
“Yes.”
“All of them?”
“Yes.”
“No favorites?”
I laugh, but it breaks halfway through. “No. They’re…very different. But they’re mine. Or they were.”
“This isn’t an easy situation you put yourself in.”
Another laugh. “No, it is not.”
“Vivian sounds like a real piece of work. I can understand wanting to step out of the mess.”
I nod, sighing. “She’s impossible. Too powerful. Too much of a hold over everyone.”
She leans forward again, resting her elbows on her knees. “If I had a chance to be with your father again, do you think anything could’ve stopped me?”
I shake my head.
“Not a scandal. Not a company. Not a complicated relationship or a power structure. It took death to separate us.”
That catches me.
She smiles softly. “Love doesn’t care about rules, Parker. It doesn’t care about optics or PR or who makes more money or how messy it gets.”
“But it costs things.”
“Regret costs more.”
I sit with her words for a long time. We don’t fill the silence with noise. We don’t reach for distractions. We just breathe in it—me staring at the embroidery on the armrest, her watching my face like she’s trying to commit it to memory.
I wipe my cheek with the sleeve of my sweater. “Do you think it’s fixable?”
She nods, like it’s not even a question. “Love doesn’t break that easily.”
“But what about everything else?”
“Everything else is just background noise.”
I shake my head. “Phil won’t forgive me. He’ll lose it. He’s been protective since Dad died, but this—this is different.”
She snorts softly. “Sweetheart, Phil has been full of hot air and self-importance ever since he learned how to use the TV remote before you did.”
I blink at her. Then laugh, for real this time.
Her eyes twinkle behind her glasses. “He thinks it’s his job to manage everyone’s lives, but he forgets that you’re grown now. Sometimes, I do too. But you’ve made a home. You’ve raised two children. You built something for yourself. He can’t see past the past.”
“He means well.”
“He does. He thinks he knows what’s best for us both, and he’s not shy about saying so.” She sits up straighter. Then she smiles, sweet and gentle. “Fuck Phil.”
I stare at her. Mouth open. “Mom!”
She sips her tea like she didn’t just detonate a bomb in the living room.
“Did you just?—”
“I did.”
“You’ve never sworn in front of me in your entire life.”
“I’m old. I get one.”
I blink. Then break into a laugh so loud I startle the cat on the windowsill.
My mom just sits there smiling like the Queen of Zen, watching me come apart one giggle at a time. And for the first time in what feels like days, I let myself believe things might be okay.