Chapter 40
Chapter Forty
Bea paused at the door of Gage’s penthouse.
Knock, or key in the code?
He’d told her more than once that she shouldn’t hesitate. So she typed the five-digit combination. The lock clicked open, and she stepped inside.
He was already standing, one hand braced on the kitchen island. His head lifted the moment the door opened, like he’d felt it before he heard it.
“Hi,” she said, breath catching.
“Happy birthday, sweetheart.”
She went to him.
He didn’t speak at first. Just held her.
“I’m sorry we couldn’t do more this year.” There was regret in his voice, but no apology. He wouldn’t apologize for circumstances he couldn’t control.
It had been more than two weeks since the headlines faded. But the questions loitered behind like unwanted guests.
They both felt it was best to stay out of the limelight as much as possible.
They hadn’t unpacked why she’d asked her parents and Claire not to come for her birthday. If it had stung—if he’d read it as doubt—he didn’t say so. He just let the silence carry what words might have made worse.
“I don’t need more than this.” Bea smiled up at him. “Just you.” And she meant it. Completely.
“I didn’t have time to cook,” he said. “Victoria handled the food.”
“You let her pick the menu?”
“I told her what you’d want.”
He led her to the dining area, where the lights had been lowered to a soft amber glow. The table was set with bone-white dishes and deep blue napkins folded into cranes. Jasmine and peonies sat low in the center, delicate and fragrant, like the room had been scented just for her.
At the center: a jewel-toned spread of sushi and sashimi, flanked by bowls of steaming rice and miso soup.
He pulled out her chair, then took the seat across from her.
They lingered over the meal. Swapped memories, not plans. The first time they’d met in Mayfield Hall, when she’d thought of him only as Georgie’s gorgeous cousin. The time she’d visited his office with a container of bulgogi rice balls she’d made herself.
The night she’d told him, voice shaking, that she believed sex was for love. He reminisced dryly that the subsequent months had been made bearable through boxing and a running tab of cold showers.
At one point, she laughed so hard at a comment he made that she dropped her fork. He caught her hand before she could reach for it, thumb brushing over her knuckles once.
She found herself cataloging every detail. The pendant light above his dining table, long and linear, suspended by near-invisible wires. The scent of the wine he’d opened for her: crushed pear, lemon zest, the faintest trace of brioche. The exact way his voice dipped when he said her name.
Some part of her brain whispered: remember this.
After dinner, they sat on the couch with a small mango chiffon cake. No candle, but she didn’t need one. It felt like a birthday. They ate it together with two forks.
And then he said it. “We should talk about January.”
She nodded, eyes finding the pattern in the wood grain of the table.
“What are you thinking?” he asked.
She hadn’t told him about the opportunity at Monaghan no, she hadn’t slept with him yet.
“It’s not a no. It’s just not yet.” Lillian blushed.
“Power move, honestly. Make him earn it,” Georgie said, nibbling on her olive.
“If he survives the wait, he deserves the win,” Bea said with a small smile.
“This coming from the woman who made Gage King wait four months after making it official,” Isabel said dryly.
“Hey, I made him rice balls first. That’s practically second base in my culture.”
They moved on to Naomi’s wedding planning. She’d narrowed her wedding dress options down to ‘only eleven.’ That was after eliminating anything that didn’t look good from a drone.
“The aerial view is part of the narrative,” Naomi said with deadly sincerity.
Bea kept sneaking glances at Isabel during that part. The lashes. The calm. The edge. There was something surgical about her tonight.
“Are you okay?” she asked finally, low enough only Isabel could hear.
Isabel turned to her. “Not quite. But I will be. And until then, I’m dressing like I already am.”
The waiter arrived with another round of drinks.
Isabel’s eyes scanned the lounge. “Tonight I want to be admired by someone I’m not going to marry.”
“I don’t think that’s going to be a problem,” Lillian said, tilting her head toward the group of men across from them.
Isabel raised her glass. “To being nobody’s almost.”
Georgina followed. “To the look on his face when he realizes.”
Naomi lifted hers. “To abundant choices.”
Lillian smiled softly. “To new beginnings.”
Bea raised hers last. “To getting your story back.”
She’d written the UR Countdown Coffee List months ago, thinking she was clever.
Back when this was still supposed to be a graceful goodbye. One last loop of the city, sampling all the wackiest brews, before she packed up her life and followed the man she loved across the world.
But the more she tried to say goodbye, the more she caught herself falling deeper for it—street by street, sip by sip, like the city was clinging to her, too.
There was so much she still hadn’t touched. So many corners she’d never wandered down. Flavors and people and stories tucked between buildings and bus stops, waiting to be found. And she wanted to find them.
The barista set the drink down first.
Clear, double-walled glass mug with coffee the color of volcanic rock, topped with a thin golden crust of crackle glazing the top like frost on asphalt.
She cracked it with her teaspoon. Took a sip.
It was strong. Violent and alive.
Then came the scroll.
Golden. Beautiful. Flaky in a way that implied structural instability.
She pulled it apart, devouring it one spiral at a time.
It started with crunch. Cinnamon and heat and burnt sugar.
Then it went quiet. Softer. Deeper. Like it had something to confess the further you got inside.
She took another bite. And felt it hit.
Not the pastry. The ache.
Because this—this scroll, this coffee, this corner of Dover Street she’d never paid attention to until she thought her time was running out—this was the problem.
She didn’t want to leave.
She wasn’t done with the UR.
And the truth was even more damning than that: she wasn’t done with herself here.
She opened her Notes app once more.
Black Sugar Flat + Burnt Cinnamon Scroll – the unnamed café off Dover Street
I thought this was a goodbye list. But maybe it’s just been a map…leading me all the way back to the beginning.
Her eyes stung. She took another sip. Burned her tongue.
Good. She deserved it.