Chapter 8 Ethan
ETHAN
My hand spasms.
It’s a subtle glitch—a misfire in the nerve endings of my right hand as I grip the neck of the crystal decanter. To anyone else, I’m the picture of corporate stoicism. To me, it’s a warning shot.
I pour the whiskey. The amber liquid splashes against the glass, loud and messy.
Tessa.
I down the shot. The burn is sharp, stripping the lining of my throat, but it doesn’t touch the chaos she just detonated in my chest.
“Control,” I rasp in the empty room. “I need it back.”
I slam the glass down on my desk. The sound echoes in the silence of my office.
I need to work. It’s the only structure keeping the chaos at bay.
I sit down at my desk, waking my monitors. The blue light floods my vision. I pull up the term sheet. The call with the lead partner at Sterling Capital is at noon. I have twenty minutes to review the equity dilution clauses.
I read the first paragraph. The words swim. Dilution. Equity. Vesting. Tessa. Red. Trouble.
“Fuck,” I growl, shoving the keyboard away.
The door to my office opens.
I don’t look up. I know who it is. Only two people walk into my office without knocking, and they usually travel in a pack.
“You look like you went twelve rounds with a heavyweight,” Owen’s voice floats from the doorway. “And lost.”
“I’m busy,” I say, staring at the screen.
“You’re staring at a screensaver,” Asher points out.
I look up. They are standing there, my brothers. My partners. The only two people on this planet I trust with my life.
Owen is leaning against the doorframe, his suit jacket slung over his shoulder, looking effortlessly unruffled. Asher is prowling toward the window, his hoodie up, his eyes scanning the room as if looking for threats.
They know. They always know.
“The intern said you kicked her out,” Owen says, walking over to the whiskey decanter. He pours himself a glass. “She was terrified. She said the air in there was heavy enough to crack the glass.”
“I was finishing a meeting,” I say tightly.
“With Tessa,” Owen clarifies. He takes a sip, watching me over the rim of the glass. “Strange. Usually, meetings involve talking. But after you kicked us out, it was dead silent.”
“We were discussing the campaign,” I lie. “She challenged the branding. She was right. We’re going with ‘Be Seen.’”
Owen raises his eyebrows. “You caved? On the ‘Shark’ strategy?”
“I pivoted,” I correct him. “The data supports her approach. Asher confirmed it.”
“I did,” Asher says from the window without looking at us. He’s looking down at the street, watching the traffic below. “The ‘Buffering’ concept is mathematically sound. It targets the highest friction point in the user journey. It’s precise.”
“See?” I gesture to Asher. “Business decision.”
“Uh-huh.” Owen sets his glass down on my desk. He leans forward, placing his hands on the black marble. His playful grin is gone. “Ethan. Look at me.”
I force myself to hold his stare.
“You have lipstick on your collar,” Owen says softly.
My hand flies to my neck. I rub the fabric, feeling the heat rush up my face.
Owen laughs, but it’s a dry, humorless sound. “Gotcha.”
“There is no lipstick,” I snap, dropping my hand. “Because nothing happened.”
“But you checked,” Owen points out. “Which means you wanted something to happen. Or you got close enough that it could have happened.”
“Drop it, Owen.”
“I can’t drop it,” Owen says. “Because I’m the one who took her to lunch and held her hand. You look at me like I’m the one flirting with the line. But you? You just sprinted across it.”
“I didn’t cross anything,” I argue, though the lie tastes like ash in my mouth. “I pulled back and walked away.”
“You walked out on her,” Asher repeats. He turns away from the window. “Did you make sure she was okay?”
“She’s a grown woman, Asher. She can handle the aftermath of a meeting.”
“She left the building,” Asher says, his voice flat and clinical. “She bypassed her desk, went to the bathroom for three minutes, and then likely took an Uber home. She’s gone.”
I stare at him. “How do you know that?”
“I track everything,” Asher says simply. “It’s my job.”
I rub my hands over my fac. “God. We are a mess. We are a complete, absolute mess.”
“We’re human,” Owen says. “For once.”
“We can’t afford to be human,” I snap. “Not right now. We have investors who think we’re machines, and a launch that’s going to define our entire future. If we get distracted… if we get involved in a messy office romance with our sister’s best friend… we lose the edge.”
“Maybe the edge is overrated,” Owen suggests.
“The edge is the only reason we aren’t still sleeping in a van in Oakland, eating expired canned goods.”
Silence falls over the room. It’s heavy. Owen looks away. Asher goes completely still.
We don’t talk about the Oakland years often.
The years after the military, when we were discharged with nothing but shrapnel scars and an idea Asher had scribbled in a notebook.
We lived in that van for eighteen months while we wrote the codebase.
We made a pact back then. Survival first. The mission first. The unit first.
Attachment was a liability we couldn’t afford in the sandbox, and we decided we couldn’t afford it in the boardroom either. Feelings are variables that introduce chaos.
“Women were always temporary,” I say, my voice low. “We agreed. No wives. No girlfriends. No divided loyalties.”
“We shared,” Owen reminds me quietly. “Back then.”
“Because we had to,” I counter. “Because we were too broken to offer anyone a whole version of ourselves. Sharing wasn’t a kink. It was a necessity. It was the only way to feel something without having to explain the nightmares.”
I look at them. “But we never kept them. We never let them inside the circle. Tessa is already inside.”
“The call,” Asher says, breaking the tension. “It’s 11:55.”
I nod, exhaling loudly. “Fine. Let’s get this done.”
The call is a bloodbath.
Mr. Sterling, the lead partner at Sterling Capital, is in a mood. He hates the timeline. He hates the burn rate. He hates that we haven’t officially announced the leadership team.
“The market needs faces,” Sterling’s voice crackles over the speakerphone. “The ‘Phantom Trio’ gimmick was cute for Series A, Mr. Branson. But for Series B? We need accountability. We need to know who is driving the bus.”
“You know who is driving,” I say smoothly, leaning back in my chair. “You have our vitals. You have the code audit. The anonymity builds hype. It drives curiosity.”
“It drives uncertainty,” Sterling counters. “And frankly, the branding feels… sterile. We are investing in a social platform, not a bank vault.”
I glance at Owen. He gives me a tiny nod.
“We agree,” I say. “That’s why we’re pivoting the brand strategy. We are rebranding for the Beta launch next week. The campaign is called ‘Be Seen.’ It focuses on vulnerability and human connection. It targets the isolation demographic directly.”
“Vulnerability?” Sterling sounds skeptical. “That is risky.”
“It’s calculated,” I say, channeling Tessa’s voice from earlier. “Efficiency scales, Mr. Sterling. But empathy retains. We aren’t just selling an algorithm. We’re selling a cure for loneliness.”
Silence on the line. I hold my breath.
“A cure for loneliness,” Sterling repeats. “That is… compelling. Very well. Send me the deck. If the creative matches the pitch, you have your funding.”
The line clicks dead. I let out a breath, slumping slightly in my chair.
“Nice pivot,” Owen says, loosening his tie. “You sounded like her.”
“I sounded like a CEO listening to his expert strategist,” I correct him.
“You sounded like a man who knows he was wrong,” Asher says from the couch.
I ignore him. I stand up, walking to the window. The noon sun is blinding against the glass.
“Is she really gone?” I ask, my voice sounding hollow.
“No,” Asher says, finally looking up from his tablet. “She never left. She went to the bathroom to hide for a few minutes, then hit the break room for a caffeine spike. She’s been back at her desk.”
I glare at him. “You said she took an Uber.”
“I said the statistics suggested it,” Asher counters, a tiny, almost invisible spark of mischief in his eyes. “I didn’t say it happened. I wanted to see your heart rate spike. It did. Mission accomplished.”
I stiffen. “I ended the meeting. She should have taken the hint.”
“She doesn’t take hints, Ethan. She takes ground,” Owen murmurs, a knowing glint in his eyes. “You ended it by running. You’re the one who walked out, and we both know that’s a first. That’s why we like her—she’s the only variable you can’t solve.”
I turn from the window. “We don’t like her.
We employ her. And as of this moment, we are implementing a firewall.
No more lunches, Owen. No more rides home, Asher.
We keep it strictly professional. We survive the launch, we get the funding, and we make sure our sister stays in Europe until she’s missed the chance to realize we almost inducted her best friend into the unit. ”
“Claimed,” Owen corrects softly. “We almost claimed her.”
“Same thing,” I snap. “It ends now.”
I grab my jacket. “I’m going to check the dev team. If you see her… ignore her.”
I walk out of the office.
The main floor is loud, developers moving between desks with fresh coffee. I keep my eyes forward, marching toward the dev bay.
But I have to pass her desk.
Tessa is there. She’s hunched over her keyboard, typing with a ferocity that suggests she’s trying to punch holes in the glass screen.
She looks up as I approach.
Her hazel eyes collide with mine. For a second, I see the heat flare up—the memory of the conference room, the almost-kiss, the hunger.
She opens her mouth. “Ethan…”
“Mr. Branson,” I correct her, my voice ice, as I keep walking without slowing down. “Have the ‘Be Seen’ assets on my server by five. No excuses.”
She flinches. The hope in her eyes dies, replaced by a cold, hard shutter coming down.
“Yes, sir,” she whispers.
I walk past her. I force myself not to look back. I force myself to ignore the way her scent clings to the air.
I just broke her. I saw it happen.
And God help me, I have to keep walking.
I’m still in my office with the blinds drawn tight, because if I look out there, I’ll go to her. I will drag her into this office, lock the door, and finish what we started on the conference table.
And that cannot happen.
I pace the length of the room. My skin feels too tight.
I check my watch. She should be leaving soon.
A murmur of voices drifts in from the bullpen.
I stop moving. I step to the blinds, cracking them just a fraction of an inch.
Owen is leaning against Tessa’s desk. He’s holding a bottle of champagne. He’s smiling at her—that easy, charming smile that makes everyone feel like they’re the only person in the room.
“You have the ‘murder face’ on,” he says to her.
Tessa is looking up at him. She looks exhausted. Wrecked. But as Owen talks, her shoulders drop. A small smile touches her lips.
He touches her hand.
My grip on the blind slat tightens until the plastic bends.
Don’t touch her, Owen.
But he does. He covers her hand with his. He leans in close, whispering something that makes her blush.
Tessa glances at my closed door. I can see the conflict in her eyes. She’s looking for me. She’s waiting for me to come out and stop this. To claim her.
Come on, Tess, I urge silently. Tell him no. Tell him you work for me.
But she doesn’t.
She stands up, grabs her purse, and lets Owen take her arm.
I watch them walk toward the elevators. Owen says something else, and she laughs—a quiet sound carries across the office before they step into the elevator and the doors slide shut.
I let go of the blinds. They snap back into place with a sharp clack.
I walk back to my desk and sink into the chair.
I won. I pushed her away. I protected the company.
I pull my phone out and open the photo of the red dress.
Which one guarantees I get laid?
“Looks like you found out, Tessa,” I whisper to the empty room.
I toss the phone onto the desk.