7. Skye
— ? —
Skye
The boundaries arrive in writing, notarized and copied in triplicate.
Shelby helped me draft them. We sat at her kitchen table until two in the morning, Josh asleep in the next room, while she typed and I dictated and we both pretended this was a normal thing to do.
Write up a legal document dictating how your ex-fiancé is allowed to interact with you at the job he created specifically to trap you.
Normal Tuesday night stuff.
I demand an absolute end to personal conversations, closed doors, or mentions of the past, requiring all future communication to be documented and forwarded directly to human resources. A minimum distance of three feet in all shared spaces.
There will be absolutely no contact outside of regular business hours, no gifts, and no flowers, and you can completely forget about making any surprise acquisitions of whatever companies I might try to flee to next.
That last one was Shelby’s idea. She said it with a straight face and I laughed until I cried. Jaime signs every term without negotiating.
His lawyer calls mine, asks if we’re serious about the three-feet rule, and when my lawyer says yes, there’s a long pause before the line goes dead. The signed documents arrive by courier the next morning. His signature is sharp and precise at the bottom of every page.
He offers absolutely no arguments, pushback, or attempts to charm his way out of a single clause.
I don’t know what to do with that.
For two weeks, we orbit each other in excruciating silence.
I fetch his coffee, and he thanks me like I’m a stranger.
Like he didn’t spend four years learning exactly how I take mine.
Like we didn’t used to fight over the last cup in the pot every Sunday morning, back when Sunday mornings meant something.
I schedule his meetings. He confirms without looking at me. His eyes stay fixed on his monitor, or his phone, or the window behind my head. Anywhere but my face.
The tension in every conference room could shatter bulletproof glass.
“Did you see that?” Nate from accounting whispers to his cubicle neighbor after a budget meeting. “She handed him the quarterly report and he literally stopped breathing.”
“I heard he bought the company just to find her.”
“I heard she left him at the altar.”
“I heard she’s the one from the video. The sidewalk thing.”
“No way. That woman was taller.”
“It’s definitely her. Look at the bone structure.”
Our coworkers have started taking bets. Shelby showed me the spreadsheet someone created in a shared drive. Twenty dollars says he cracks first. Fifty says she quits by Friday. A hundred on them sleeping together by the end of the month.
I want to be offended, but honestly, it’s the most entertainment this office has seen in years. They deserve something for putting up with the constant awkwardness.
I am absolutely not going to crack under this forced proximity to the man who ruined me.
I honestly survived way worse than this when I handled labor without him in a hospital room, pushed through newborn nights with no partner, and lived with the kind of intense loneliness that makes you completely forget your own voice.
This is nothing. He is nothing.
I keep telling myself that until I almost believe it.
Then the elevator stalls between floors.
We’re coming back from a lunch meeting with investors. Jaime walks three feet ahead of me, maintaining the agreed-upon distance like his life depends on it. The elevator is empty when we step in. Small mercies.
The doors close and the car begins to rise.
And then the lights flicker.
Twice. The fluorescent panels above us stutter and die, replaced by the dim red glow of emergency lighting. The car jerks to a stop so suddenly that I grab the railing to keep from falling.
Jaime’s hand shoots out to steady me.
His palm lands on my elbow, warm through the thin fabric of my blouse, and we both freeze. His fingers tighten for just a second before he catches himself and pulls back like I’ve burned him.
“Sorry,” he murmurs.
I don’t respond.
My heart is absolutely pounding right now, and it has nothing to do with being stuck in this elevator or being trapped.
It’s entirely because of the heat of his hand still lingering on my skin and the way my body just automatically leaned right toward him before my brain even had a chance to intervene.
Traitor.
I press the emergency call button. Nothing. Press it again. Still nothing. The maintenance line rings endlessly, that hollow sound of a phone no one’s going to answer.
Finally, the building intercom crackles to life.
“Attention all occupants. We’re experiencing a temporary elevator malfunction. Maintenance has been notified. Please remain calm. Estimated repair time is fifteen to twenty minutes. We apologize for the inconvenience.”
Fifteen to twenty minutes.
I’m trapped in a six-by-six metal box with the last person on earth I want to be alone with. For fifteen to twenty minutes. In emergency lighting that makes everything feel smaller and closer and more dangerous.
Jaime moves to the opposite wall. I stay pressed to mine. The distance between us is maybe four feet. One foot more than the agreed minimum. Not enough.
The emergency lights cast his face in shadows, hollowing his cheeks, making his eyes look darker. He loosens his tie and undoes the top button of his shirt. I watch his throat work when he swallows, watch the way the red light catches the sharp line of his jaw.
I notice the way his shirt pulls across his chest. Notice that he’s broader than he used to be. Notice the new lines around his eyes, the weight he carries differently now.
I hate myself for noticing. I hate myself more for not looking away.
Five minutes pass by in this completely suffocating silence where I can literally hear him breathing, my own heartbeat, and the distant hum of the building just carrying on without us.
By the time ten minutes hit, neither of us has said a word, and the air is just getting thicker and warmer, making me wonder if the ventilation is completely failing or if it’s something else.
“You look good,” he finally says. His voice is quiet. “Stronger.”
I should ignore him. That’s what the boundaries are for. No personal conversation. But the silence is worse. The silence leaves too much room for other things.
“I had to be.”
“Because of me.”
“Yes.”
He nods in complete acceptance, offering no defense or excuse beyond a simple acknowledgment.
“You did something with your hair,” he continues. “It’s shorter.”
“It’s been four years. A lot of things are shorter. My patience for one.”
I regret the nonsensical words the moment they leave my mouth, but he refuses to push or ask what I mean, letting them hang heavily between us instead.
“I looked for you every day.” His voice drops more raw. “I hired three different private investigators. Paid them more than most people make in a year. They all said you’d vanished. Like you’d never existed.”
“That was the point.”
“I know.” He pauses. Swallows. “Your parents wouldn’t tell me anything. I showed up at their house twice. Your father threatened to call the police.”
“Good for him.”
“Shelby threatened to castrate me.”
Despite myself, despite everything, I almost smile. “That sounds like Shelby.”
“She meant it. I could tell.” He almost smiles too, just for a second, before it fades. “I deserved it.”
“You deserved worse.”
“I know that too.”
The elevator shudders. My stomach drops. For one horrible second I think we’re falling, that the cable has snapped, that this is how it ends. Trapped in a metal box with my ex-fiancé, plummeting forty floors to our deaths.
But the lights brighten. The car jerks upward. The normal hum of machinery returns, and we’re moving again. Rising toward the lobby like nothing happened.
I let out a breath.
The doors slide open to a floor full of executives waiting impatiently for their turn. They look annoyed. Completely unaware of what just happened in this tiny metal box.
I step forward to exit. His hand brushes mine.
I know it’s not an accident. His fingers graze my knuckles, just for a second. The touch is so light it could almost be imagined. Could almost be explained away as two people occupying the same small space.
But I know. And he knows I know.
I don’t pull away fast enough.
The realization that will keep me awake tonight is not that he touched me, but that I actively let him do it because some part of me genuinely wanted him to.
I walk out without looking back. My skin burns where his fingers made contact. My heart hammers against my ribs. I can feel his eyes on me, watching me go, and I don’t turn around.
I make it to the bathroom before I fall apart.
The door locks behind me as I grip the sink with both hands and stare at my reflection, taking in my flushed cheeks, bright eyes, and the face of a woman who just felt something she never should have felt.
“Get it together,” I whisper to the mirror. “He’s not yours anymore. He was never really yours.”
The mirror doesn’t answer. My reflection just stares back, unconvinced.
My phone buzzes.
Shelby: How did the investor meeting go?
I type back with shaking fingers.
Me: Fine. Elevator got stuck.
Shelby: Stuck??? With who?
Me: Who do you think.
Shelby: OH NO. For how long? What happened? Are you okay?
Me: Twenty minutes. Nothing happened. I’m fine.
Typing out that lie tastes completely bitter even in a text message, because it wasn’t just a brush of fingers or a look, it was the absolute demolition of every single wall I have spent the last four years building.
Shelby: Skye. I can see you typing and deleting. What aren’t you telling me?
I put the phone down. Splash cold water on my face and force myself to breathe.
What am I supposed to tell her? That he touched my hand and I forgot how to move? That I spent twenty minutes memorizing the new lines on his face? That some sick, broken part of me still responds to him like a flower turning toward the sun?
She’d kill me. She’d be right to.
I dry my face and fix my makeup, and go back to my desk. Jaime’s office door is closed. The blinds are drawn. He’s in there, probably thinking about the same twenty minutes I can’t stop replaying.
My computer pings with a new email.
From: Jaime MillerTo: Skye WarrenSubject: Quarterly Budget Review
Please schedule the department heads for Thursday at 2 p.m. Conference room B.
Professional, exactly what I asked for. I should be relieved.
I type back a confirmation, forward the thread to HR per the agreement, and spend the next three hours pretending I can’t feel the ghost of his fingers on my skin.
At five o’clock, I pack up my things. Josh needs to be picked up from daycare. Dinner needs to be made. Laundry needs to be folded. Real life needs to resume.
I’m almost to the elevator when I hear my name.
“Skye.”
I turn. Jaime stands in his office doorway, three feet away exactly, hands in his pockets.
“The investor meeting,” he says. “You handled yourself well today. Very professional.”
“Thank you.”
“I mean it.” His eyes hold mine for a beat too long. “You’ve changed. The woman I knew would have been terrified to speak in a room full of executives.”
“The woman you knew doesn’t exist anymore.”
“I’m starting to realize that.”
He doesn’t say anything else. Just nods once and retreats back into his office. The door closes and the blinds stay drawn.
I stand there for ten seconds. Then I walk away.
The elevator doors open and I step inside alone, catching my reflection in the polished metal walls as the car descends to reveal those same flushed cheeks, bright eyes, and the woman who let him touch her hand without pulling away.
“He’s not yours,” I tell my reflection again. “And you’re not his.”
But my hand still tingles where his fingers brushed it.