Chapter 27
Chapter twenty-seven
Lila
The car is too quiet.
I sit rigid in the back seat, hands folded too neatly in my lap, like it might keep things from spilling. The driver’s partition is up. Privacy glass. To give us space.
Cam sits beside me.
I can feel him even when he’s not looking at me. The tension in his body. The way his knee bounces, restless and sharp, like something in him can't sit still.
Streetlights slide past in slow streaks. Gold. White. Blur.
I should say something neutral. I don’t. I let him speak first.
“So,” Cam says. “Bas.”
I turn my head slowly. "What about him?”
My voice comes out even. But I’m not calm. I’m braced.
“The hugging,” he says. “The way you lit up.”
Something in my chest tightens.
I exhale through my nose. “Cam.”
He waits.
“He’s a songwriter,” I say. “One of my main collaborators.”
“So?”
I look at him fully now. Brows lifting despite myself. “We work together.”
“You don’t light up like that with everyone you work with.”
The words sting.
My mouth tightens. “Wow.”
“I’m serious,” he says. “It felt intimate.”
I let out a short laugh. It comes out wrong. Sharp. Defensive. “You think hugging a friend and talking music is intimate?”
“I think it looked like more than that.”
“That’s on you,” I snap, then force myself to slow down. Breathe. “Cam, I wasn’t flirting. I wasn’t doing anything wrong.”
He shifts beside me, frustration radiating off him. “You forgot I was even there.”
“That’s not true.”
“You didn’t look at me once.”
I stare at him, incredulous. “Because I was working.”
“So was he.”
“Yes,” I say sharply. “Because that’s literally his job.”
The car feels smaller. Hotter.
“Bas is…” Cam hesitates, quieter now. “He’s in your world. He belongs there."
“Is that what this is about?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer.
I shake my head, already feeling the familiar ache bloom. “Cam, you’re reading meaning into something that doesn’t exist.”
“It exists to me.”
The words drop between us.
I see it immediately. There is nothing I can say to make him understand.
The way his jaw tightens. The way he turns toward the window, reflection hard and distant, like a version of him I don’t recognize.
Silence stretches.
Heavy. Unfinished.
The turn signal clicks. The car slows.
I face forward again, shoulders squaring, my armor sliding back into place.
Neither of us apologizes.
***
The next morning settles into something fragile.
Not peace. Not resolution.
A truce.
Coffee cools untouched on the counter. Both our phones stay face-down like they might explode if we look at them wrong. We move around each other carefully, the way you do with something breakable.
Polite. Functional. Careful.
I answer emails I don’t remember receiving. Cam scrolls through something on his phone, jaw tight, shoulders squared. We exist in parallel lines.
Nothing explodes.
I call that a win.
Then Cam’s phone rings.
I see his body react before he even looks at the screen. The way his spine straightens. The way his jaw locks like something just snapped into place.
My stomach drops.
Evelyn Sterling.
He puts it on speaker without asking. The sound of her voice fills the kitchen, calm and measured, the way someone sounds before they deliver bad news.
“Cam. Lila.”
I brace without knowing why.
“I’m calling because ERS has initiated a Compliance Review of your marriage contract.”
The room tilts.
My breath catches sharp and shallow, like I’ve been punched just under the ribs.
“A review?” Cam asks.
“Yes,” Evelyn says gently. “An anonymous complaint was submitted overnight.”
I glance at Cam. His face is locked down. Unreadable.
“It flagged boundary violations,” she continues, “concerns of emotional entanglement affecting public perception, and a suggestion that one partner may be using the other to rehabilitate public image.”
I feel cold all at once.
My chest tightens as something ugly clicks into place.
Cam must have told them the kiss crossed a line.
That I crossed it.
I don’t look at him.
Because if I do and I see confirmation in his face, I’m not sure I’ll stay standing.
Evelyn keeps talking. Process. Protocol. Timelines. Reassurances wrapped in clean corporate language.
I hear almost none of it.
Cam doesn’t reach for me.
I don’t reach for him.
I’m only half-listening to Evelyn’s voice when my phone buzzes in my hand.
The headline fills the display, bold and brutal, like it’s proud of the damage it’s about to do.
CAM DRAKE ‘PLAYS HERO’ — USING LILA HART’S ANXIETY TO FIX HIS IMAGE?
My vision blurs.
Under it is a still from rehearsal.
Cam stepping in front of me. His body angled protectively. My head lowered. Small. Exposed.
My breath stutters. I swallow hard, staring at the screen like it might correct itself if I wait long enough.
Of course this is how they spin it.
The moment I felt safest gets rewritten into proof I was useful.
I don’t realize I’ve gone still until Cam says my name.
“Lila?”
I can’t answer.
If I speak, I’ll break.
My shoulders pull inward on instinct, like I’m trying to make myself smaller, less visible, less easy to weaponize. The familiar shame creeps in fast and sharp.
What if he's just using me?
I glance up at Cam without meaning to.
His face is unreadable.
And my heart twists, cruel and fast.
There is no reassurance in his eyes.
Only distance.
Resignation settles in my chest, heavy and familiar, like an old coat I never wanted back but somehow kept.
I lower the phone and keep my gaze on the counter instead of him.
Because if I look at him now and see confirmation—
I don’t know how I’ll survive it.
Evelyn is still talking.
All I can think is how quickly something tender turns into evidence.
And how easy it is for the world to convince me that I should have known better than to trust him.
I take a step back without meaning to.
The movement feels instinctive. Protective. Like space might keep me from saying the wrong thing—or hearing the thing I’m most afraid he’ll confirm.
Evelyn clears her throat softly through the speaker. “I’m going to end the call for now. We’ll follow up once the review parameters are finalized.”
“Yes,” I say quickly. Too quickly. “That’s fine.”
My voice sounds steady. My hands don’t.
“Take care of each other,” Evelyn adds. “Both of you.”
The call ends.
The kitchen goes dead quiet.
I lower my phone to my lap. I don’t look at Cam.
Neither of us says a word.
My shoulders pull in.
Defensive. Braced.
I look up, sensing the shift. “Cam—”
He cuts me off.
“So which is it?”
His voice is low. Controlled. Worse than yelling.
My brows knit. “What are you talking about?”
“This,” he says, gesturing vaguely between us. The air. The headlines. The silence thick enough to choke on. “Hot and cold. Public and private. One foot in, one foot out.”
Disbelief flashes through me. “Are you serious right now?”
“You aren't denying it.”
“Denying what?” I snap. “That I hugged a friend? That I have a job?”
“You’re smiling at other guys and icing me out.”
“I told you already,” I say. My voice shakes despite my effort to steady it. “He’s a songwriter. I did nothing wrong.”
“Funny,” Cam replies, bitterness threading through his voice. “That’s not what it looks like.”
Silence slams down between us.
The kind that isn’t empty. The kind that bruises.
“If you wanted out,” I say, “you could’ve just said so.”
Something dark flickers across his face.
“You’re the one letting your ex and the internet rewrite our story,” he fires back. “I’ve been standing here taking hits while you decide whether I’m worth defending.”
The accusation burns.
“I don’t have to defend myself to you,” I say, heat rising. Old instincts snapping into place.
He nods once. Sharp. Final.
“So much for our 'mutually beneficial partnership'.”
I inhale, pride hardening into something brittle. “Maybe you should go.”
He stares at me for a beat too long. Then nods.
“Then I will.”
The room goes wrong immediately. Too big. Too hollow.
I swallow, my voice dropping despite myself. “Do we dissolve the contract?”
He looks away. Jaw flexing.
The pause is agony.
“Maybe that’s for the best,” he says finally. “Have Evelyn talk to my team.”
Something inside me cracks clean through.
And still—he doesn’t stop.
He turns and walks out before I can say anything else.
The door closes.
The penthouse goes quiet.
And so does my heart— because it finally believes what it’s been afraid of all along.
He was never going to choose me.