Chapter 32 Nick
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Nick
“Isla Vale.”
Jonah doesn’t bother with pleasantries. He drops into the chair opposite me in the small executive conference room, the morning sun glinting off a stack of folders he’s already sorted by priority. His expression tells me the contents skew heavily toward urgent.
“What have you found out?” I ask, straightening, palms flat on the polished walnut.
“That she’s a vulture,” he replies. “One with an exceptional talent for smelling blood that isn’t hers.”
He slides the first file across the table. A headline glares up at me, “KINSEY COVER UP?”, followed by three pages of conjecture masquerading as investigative work.
Blake Kinsey’s photograph sits in the corner, eyes hollow, jaw clenched. I remember that look, every ex-athlete does. It’s the expression of a man who thought he’d outrun the past only to discover it has better stamina.
“She operates on a pattern,” Jonah continues.
“Retired athlete, preferably one who exited under less than glorious circumstances. She dredges up medical reports, combs court filings, bribes former trainers… anything that gives her a thread. Then she pulls until something unravels. When it doesn’t, she fabricates enough implication to keep the clicks coming. ”
“For Edge Magazine?”
“Mostly. But also subscribers, ad revenue, strategic leaks from people who hate their former heroes. It’s a cottage industry. Pain pays.”
I flip to the next dossier.
Case Study: Damon Cole. Once a top draft pick, now an empty barstool someone reserves out of pity.
Knee reconstruction, prescription mismanagement, an angry voicemail to an assistant trainer.
Vale packaged it into a six-part podcast that sold eight figures in advertising.
Nothing Cole’s lawyers did slowed her. If anything, litigation fed the narrative.
Jonah leans forward. “I spoke to Damon last night. He said she starts politely, asks for comment, claims she only wants the truth. When you refuse, the engine revs. She finds whoever will talk, pays them if she has to, and keeps going until the story breaks you or you break yourself.”
A beat of silence stretches between us. I can hear the ventilation humming, the subdued clatter of the trading desk two floors down, the faint echo of a life I run on timetables and discipline. None of it steadies me.
“What did Cole suggest?” I ask.
He exhales. “He said the only strategy that preserved any part of his sanity was to starve her. No quotes, no legal threats, nothing that widens the spotlight. Eventually the audience drifts to a louder scandal. But it took him two years of silence and cost him every endorsement he had left.”
Two years.
Endorsements are the least of my concerns; reputational collateral is replaceable currency. Sara, and the children she’s carrying, are not. Nor is the fragile equilibrium we’re trying to build.
I close the folder. “All right. No engagement. Everything goes through our comms blackout filter. If she wants a statement, she can quote the hold music.”
Jonah arches a brow. “And the board?”
“I’ll brief them before the monthly call. They can handle market jitters; it’s what they’re paid for. What matters is keeping Sara out of the blast radius.”
Jonah doesn’t move. Doesn’t nod. Just watches me in that way he does when he’s choosing his next words carefully.
“You know this doesn’t stop at market jitters,” he says finally. “Even if Vale backs off, which she won’t, you’re still sitting on a live grenade. Sooner or later, someone on the board is going to ask what, exactly, is happening with Sara Brooks. You can’t pretend it isn’t her forever.”
My jaw tightens. “I don’t want her involved—”
“I know,” he says, cutting me off gently. “But the optics don’t care. This isn’t about morality, it’s about leverage. Conflict of interest. Power imbalance. You’re the CEO. She’s…”
“I know,” I snap, hating the way Rebecca’s words flood my mind.
“And of course,” Jonah says, folding his hands, “she’s pregnant with your children. Staying in your home.”
I don’t respond right away. Not because he’s wrong, he isn’t, but because I’ve already run the calculus a hundred times.
There is no version of this where we emerge unscathed. No scenario where I disclose our relationship and it’s met with polite applause and a fruit basket from Legal.
He sighs, lowers his voice. “Nick, I’m not your handler. I’m not going to tell you how to live. You want to be with her? Good. You want to raise your family? Even better. But you don’t get to pretend the world isn’t watching just because you’re tired of being seen.”
I lean back in the chair, feel the leather creak beneath my spine. He’s right again, of course. He usually is. It’s infuriating.
“You think I don’t know this?” I say, quieter than before.
“You think I haven’t mapped every potential headline, every investor reaction, every shareholder who’ll use this to call for a vote they’ve been salivating over for years?
I know exactly how this plays. And I’ll handle it. One step at a time.”
Jonah watches me a beat longer, then nods slowly. “Just make sure the step you’re on isn’t the one off the edge.”
Sara falls asleep mid-sentence.
One moment, she’s explaining, again, how You’ve Got Mail is superior to Sleepless in Seattle because of “email tension,” whatever that means, and the next, her head drops to my shoulder.
I glance down, halfway expecting her to startle awake and accuse me of breathing too loud during Meg Ryan’s close-up.
She doesn’t.
Instead, she exhales softly and shifts closer, one hand trailing from my chest to her belly, where it settles. It must be muscle memory.
And then she drools on me.
Not figuratively. Actual drool. Warm. On my shirt. My favorite one, which, until now, had avoided the hazards of pregnancy cravings, emotional outbursts, and stovetop s’mores.
I don’t move.
I should. I could get a towel. Nudge her awake. Pretend I need water. But I don’t. Because somehow, this—her asleep, pressed against me, her hand resting over what I still can’t bring myself to call “the bump” without sounding ridiculous—is the most peace I’ve had in months.
The movie flickers in the background, voices blurring into soft nostalgia. Sara twitches once, then stills, her hand tightening slightly as she’s anchoring herself. Or the three small lives she’s carrying.
Three.
I never do anything halfway. Of course I’d end up with triplets.
I watch her for a while. Her lashes don’t flutter. Her brow isn’t creased with whatever stubborn thought she usually doesn’t share until it explodes at 1:30 a.m.
She’s not bracing. Not bartering with her emotions. Just… sleeping.
And I think: Damn, she’s brave.
Not in the self-help-book sense. Not in the “stand on a TED stage and talk about overcoming adversity” way. No, Sara’s bravery is quieter. Sharper.
The kind that still shows up after it’s been betrayed. The kind that lets someone lie next to you even when every reason in your body says run.
I can’t remember the last time I trusted someone enough to sleep this close to them. To stay when it would be easier to go. To let my shoulder serve as both pillow and evidence of mouth-related gravity.
But here I am. Shoulder soaked. Heart loud. And I make a decision without the benefit of a whiteboard or a weighted risk matrix.
I’m in.
Fully. Recklessly. Without fine print.
I’m in for the mess. The morning sickness. The swelling. The 3 a.m. medical panics. The endless gallons of chocolate milk we’re apparently going through weekly now. I’m in for every brutal, beautiful, infuriating inch of it.
Of her.
Because whatever happens next, whatever bombs Isla drops, whatever storms come barreling toward us, I’m not leaving.
I’ve left a lot of things in my life.
She won’t be one of them.