17. Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Seventeen
Ophelia
Ophelia slid the photo strip across the small café table.
“I’ve reviewed the evidence,” she said. “You were cheating.”
Gideon glanced down at the four roller-rink pictures. In the last one, they leaned into each other while Ophelia laughed. His matching strip remained in his wallet, where she’d watched him put it at the rink.
“The photograph proves nothing,” he said.
“It proves you kissed me before the third flash.”
“That wasn’t part of the race.”
“It proves a pattern of dishonesty,” she chuckled.
“You started before I agreed to the rules,” he huffed.
“You used the rail to pull yourself forward.”
“A reasonable response to fraud.”
She took the strip back. “And you still lost.”
“The result is under review.”
“By whom?”
“Me.”
“I’m sure justice will be done.”
His mouth curved. Under the brunch table, his knee rested against hers. Neither of them had moved it. Their plates had been pushed aside, and Ophelia had stolen the last piece of crisp potato from his. The closeness felt easy. Not safe enough to define, not distant enough to deny.
Gideon reached for the photo strip, then stopped. “May I?”
She handed it over.
He studied the first picture, where she pointed at his unsmiling mouth. “This is an attack.”
“That was an effort to help.”
“You put your fingers in my face.”
“Your expression was frightening children.”
“There were no children in the booth.”
“The danger was broader than the booth.”
He laughed and looked at the last image again. Ophelia watched his thumb move over the white edge of the paper. She remembered his mouth at Juliet’s door, his hands at her waist, and the hard effort it had taken to say “stop” when she wanted to pull him inside. Heat moved under her skin.
Gideon raised his eyes. His gaze sharpened, as if he knew where her thoughts had gone.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
“That wasn’t nothing.”
“You don’t get access to every thought because we had brunch.”
“I know.” He returned the strip. “I can still be curious.”
“Dangerous habit.”
“I’m trying to develop it.”
She tucked the photographs into her purse. His hand rested near his coffee cup, palm down. Ophelia placed her fingers over it. The contact didn’t frighten her this time. Gideon turned his hand and laced their fingers together. He did it slowly, giving her room to pull away. She didn’t.
“You realize,” she said, “that holding hands doesn’t settle the race.”
“I wasn’t going to mention the race.”
“You were thinking about it.”
“I was thinking about your mouth.”
Her pulse jumped. “That’s a reckless admission.”
“I’m wearing ordinary shoes. I feel unstoppable.”
She laughed. “You survived rental skates once. Let’s not become arrogant.”
His phone vibrated against the table. Gideon looked at it but didn’t release her hand. The screen went dark.
“You can check it,” Ophelia said.
“If it matters, they’ll call.”
The phone vibrated again before she answered. Then a third time. His fingers went still around hers.
“That matters,” she said.
“Yes.”
He let her go and turned the phone over.
One glance removed the warmth from his face.
He read the next message, answered with a short line, and lifted his gaze to her.
The shift in him was familiar. His shoulders straightened.
His attention narrowed. The private man across from her became the chief executive who could take in a crisis before anyone else had found the right words for it.
Ophelia’s body understood before her mind did. Her hands grew cold.
“Tell me,” she said.
“Hale Global is under a cyberattack. Parts of the freight operation are shutting down.” His voice stayed calm. “The response team is already working, but I need to go.”
Two sentences. Clear facts. No speech about markets, systems, or the weight of the Hale name. Still, the café seemed too warm. Ophelia drew her hands into her lap.
“Then go.”
Gideon watched her. “You think this is where I disappear.”
“I think your company is being attacked.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“You said you need to leave.”
“I do. I also have enough time to say this properly.”
The server passed with a tray of coffee cups. Someone at the next table laughed. Ophelia hated that the room continued as if she weren’t back in every dinner, event, and bed where Gideon had turned away because work mattered more.
“What do you want me to say?” she asked. “That I understand? I always understood.”
Pain crossed his face. “I know.”
“Real emergencies happened. So did ordinary problems you treated like emergencies. The result for me was the same.”
“I left you waiting and called it necessary.”
“Yes.”
He nodded. “My past gives you no reason to trust what happens next.”
The lack of defense reached her, but fear stayed stronger.
“What does happen next?” she asked.
“I go to Hale Tower. The people responsible for the response keep doing their jobs. I get the facts and make the decisions that belong to me.” He set his phone beside his cup. “I’ll send you an update within two hours. I’ll call you this evening.”
“Don’t promise that because I look upset.”
“I’m promising because you deserve to know what I’m going to do.”
“And if the situation gets worse?”
“The update may be one sentence. The call may be short. But you’ll get both.”
Ophelia stared at their hands, now separated by the narrow table. Part of her wanted to tell him she didn’t need anything. That old answer waited in her throat, neat and convenient. She swallowed it.
“I need you to keep those promises,” she said.
“I will.”
The certainty in his voice frightened her more than doubt would have. She’d believed that voice before.
Gideon reached toward her, then stopped. “May I kiss you?”
She hesitated. Not because she didn’t want him, but because she didn’t want the kiss to become comfort she gave while he left her again.
“My cheek,” she said.
He accepted the limit without a flicker of disappointment. He came around the table, bent, and pressed his mouth to her cheek. His hand stayed at his side.
“I’m sorry our morning ended this way,” he said.
“So am I.”
“I’ll contact you.”
“Go.”
He went.
***
At Juliet’s greystone, Ophelia opened a Threshold file and read the same paragraph four times. The mantel clock stood across the living room. Its dark hands were easy to see from the sofa, which became a problem almost at once.
Juliet walked in with two mugs and followed Ophelia’s gaze.
“It hasn’t moved,” she said.
“Clocks do move,” Ophelia said.
“Not fast enough for whatever you’re trying to force it to do.”
Ophelia accepted a mug. “I’m not forcing anything.”
“You’ve looked at it six times since I entered.”
“You just entered.”
“Exactly.” Juliet sat beside her. “What happened?”
“Hale Global is under a cyberattack. Some freight operations are shutting down.”
Juliet’s teasing vanished. “Is Gideon safe?”
“He’s at Hale Tower. His team was already responding when he left.”
“And you’re watching the clock… because?”
“He said he’d update me within two hours.”
Juliet looked at the open file. “Have you understood a word of that?”
“Not one.”
“Good. I was worried the housing plan involved staring at page seven until it confessed.”
Ophelia closed the file. “I hate this.”
“The cyberattack?”
“Waiting.”
Juliet’s expression softened. “Of course you do.”
“I feel ridiculous. His company is in real trouble, and I’m measuring whether my husband remembers to send me a message.”
“You’re not ridiculous.”
“It’s basic consideration.”
“Yes.”
“I shouldn’t be impressed if he does it.”
“Then don’t throw him a parade.”
Ophelia gave her a tired look.
Juliet sipped her coffee. “Basic consideration can still matter when you spent six years without it.”
“You sound reasonable. I dislike it.” Ophelia frowned.
“I’ll try to be more irritating.”
“You won’t have to try.”
Juliet bumped her shoulder against Ophelia’s. “There she is.”
Ophelia tried to talk about anything else.
Juliet told her a story about a parent who’d sent a twelve-paragraph complaint over one line in a reading list. Ophelia laughed in the right places.
She drank her coffee. She didn’t look at the clock again.
She looked at her phone instead. The screen stayed dark.
The old certainty settled deeper with each passing minute.
Gideon would forget. Later, he’d explain that the situation changed, that people needed him, that two hours had become impossible.
He’d be sorry. He’d mean it. Ophelia would feel cruel for expecting a message during a crisis.
She knew the whole pattern so well that her body had already reached the ending.
Her phone lit blue in her hand. Gideon’s message arrived before the two hours were complete.
Gideon: The team is containing the attack. Some operations remain down. I’m safe, and I’ll call this evening as promised.
Ophelia read it twice.
Juliet didn’t ask to see the screen. “He remembered?”
“Yes.”
“How do you feel?”
“Relieved.” She set the phone facedown. “And angry that I’m relieved.”
“At him?”
“At what it took for this to feel unusual.”
Juliet nodded. “That seems fair.”
Ophelia sent one reply.
Ophelia: Thank you. I’m at Juliet’s.
Then she reopened her work and managed to understand the paragraph she’d been reading.
When Gideon called that evening, Ophelia answered on the first ring.
“Hello.”
“Hi.” His voice was lower than usual, worn at the edges. “Is this still a good time?”
“Yes. How bad is it?”
“The team has stopped the worst of it. Some parts of the business are still down, and we’re working through the damage.”
“Are you taking over everything?”
There was a pause. “No.”
“That pause wasn’t comforting,” she scolded him.
“I wanted to.”
“That sounds more honest.”
“It’s also embarrassing.”
“I can live with your embarrassment.”
“I’ve noticed.”
Despite herself, she smiled. “Are you coming home?”
The word home slipped out before she could stop it. Astor Street was still his home, not hers. Gideon didn’t use the mistake against her.
“I may need to remain at Hale Tower overnight,” he said. “The team can work without me standing over them, but there are decisions I need to make as we learn more.”
Her grip tightened on the phone. “All right.”
“I heard that.”
“What?”
“You went quiet.”
“You’re staying at the office. I’m trying not to turn it into something else.”
“You don’t have to hide the reaction from me,” he said.
“I don’t know what else to do with it.”
“Tell me.”
Ophelia looked toward Juliet’s clock. She no longer needed it, but the sight of it still tightened her chest.
“I’m waiting for this call to be the last thing you remember,” she said. “I’m waiting for the emergency to become permission to forget me again.”
Gideon breathed out. “I understand.”
“Do you?”
“Yes. I trained you to expect silence whenever work became difficult.”
The answer eased something small and stubborn inside her.
“I’ll keep communicating,” he said. “Not because you’re monitoring me. Because you’re part of my life even while I’m here.”
Ophelia closed her eyes. “All right.”
“What did you do after I left?”
She opened them again. “What?”
“How was your afternoon?”
“You’re in the middle of a cyberattack, Gideon.”
“I’m aware.”
“And you want to know about my afternoon?”
“I want to know about you.” His tone stayed simple. “Did Juliet manage to distract you?”
“She tried. She accused me of threatening her clock.”
“Did the clock confess?”
“Not until your message came in.”
“I’m glad I could assist.”
Ophelia laughed softly. “She also told me about a parent who wrote twelve paragraphs over one sentence in a reading list.”
“Twelve?”
“Juliet counted.”
“Of course she did.”
The conversation lasted only a few more minutes. Gideon didn’t pretend the danger had passed. He also didn’t speak as if every second spent listening to Ophelia endangered the company. Before they ended, he told her he’d contact her when he knew more. He didn’t make her ask.
Later, when she’d retreated to her sister’s guest bedroom, the blue light of her phone cut across the dark room. Gideon’s name appeared on the screen.
Ophelia answered. “Are you all right?”
“Yes. Tired. The situation is steadier.”
“You sound angry.”
“I am.”
She sat up against the pillows. “What happened?”
“The access used in the attack appears connected to Kyle.”
Her relief vanished. “Connected how?”
“I don’t know enough yet. We’re confirming the facts before I say more.”
“Does Kyle know?”
“He will.”
The control in Gideon’s voice was familiar, but this time it didn’t shut her out. He’d called. He’d told her what he knew and stopped where certainty stopped.
“What are you going to do?” she asked.
“Find out what happened. Then deal with the truth.”
Ophelia wanted to believe that answer. She almost did.
“Try to rest,” he said.
“You too.”
“I’ll do my best.”
They ended the call. Ophelia held the quiet phone against her chest.
Several hours later, Gideon called once more. He told her the situation was stable enough for him to sleep and that another executive had taken over. Before they hung up, Ophelia asked when she could see him. He said he expected to finish around midnight and promised to call again.
For the first time, a real emergency had pulled Gideon away without erasing her. But the crisis had reached his family, where every old rule had always been hardest for him to break.