Chapter 17
SEVENTEEN
SCARLETT
I’m in the back office going over the new scheduling system when I hear Sophie’s voice rise from the front desk, sharp enough that my fingers still over the keyboard.
“I told you she’s busy,” Sophie says, and even from down the hall, I can hear the warning tucked under every word. “You need to leave.”
A familiar voice answers, low and strained. “I just need five minutes. Please.”
My stomach drops so hard I have to grab the edge of the desk.
Ethan. For a second, I don’t move. I just sit there, staring at the half-finished schedule on the computer screen while my pulse starts beating in my throat.
I haven’t seen him since the night I walked into our bedroom and found him with another woman.
Months have passed since then. And somehow, after all of that, he’s standing in the middle of Sophie’s clinic like he has any right to be here.
I push my chair back and stand, but I don’t walk out right away.
I take one breath, then another, trying to steady the shaking that wants to start in my hands.
But I’m not eighteen anymore, and I’m not the girl who packed up her whole life because Ethan Hayes smiled at her and promised forever.
I’m twenty-four years old, I have a job, I have my family, I have a life here, and I’m done letting him decide when I’m allowed to be strong.
I step into the hallway and the second I reach the front desk, Ethan’s eyes find mine. He looks relieved to see me, and maybe, I don’t know, hopeful. Like I’m something he misplaced and finally found.
Sophie stands between us with her arms crossed tight over her chest, and the look on her face says she’s about two seconds away from calling every man in the Iron Reapers before Ethan can blink. “He came in asking for you,” she says, her voice flat. “I told him you weren’t available.”
“I’m not here to cause problems,” Ethan says, but he isn’t looking at her anymore, he’s looking at me, wearing that same expression I used to fall for when we were younger.
The one that made me soften even when I was exhausted, hurt, and knew I deserved better than whatever crumbs he was offering.
“Scarlett, please. I drove all the way here. I just want to talk.”
Sophie turns her head toward me, and her expression gentles just enough for me to see the concern underneath the anger. “You don’t have to do this.”
“I know.” My voice comes out quieter than I expect. “But I think I need to.”
Ethan takes half a step forward, like my answer gives him permission, but Sophie moves before I do. She shifts just enough to block him, and her eyes narrow. “You get five minutes, and if I hear her raise her voice or you so much as touch that doorknob too hard, I’m calling Tank.”
Ethan’s mouth tightens at the name. “I’m not going to hurt her.”
Sophie doesn’t blink. “That’s not what I said.”
I almost smile, but I don’t. I just nod toward my office and turn without waiting to see if Ethan follows me.
His footsteps come a second later, slower than they used to, and the sound of them behind me brings back a hundred memories I don’t want.
I spent years walking beside him, behind him, around him, always orbiting his life like that was the only place I knew how to exist. Not anymore.
Once we’re inside my office, I close the door but leave it cracked, mostly because I know Sophie is listening and partly because I want Ethan to understand that I’m not alone here.
I sit behind my desk because I need the space between us, and I need the reminder that this office is mine.
Ethan looks at the chair across from me, hesitates like he’s waiting for an invitation, then sits anyway.
For a few seconds, neither of us says anything. He studies me like he’s trying to figure out what’s changed, and I let him. I let him look at my hair, my clothes, the bare ring finger he never put anything on because he always had a reason to wait. “You look good,” he says quietly.
I fold my hands in my lap so he can’t see the way my fingers curl into my palms. “That’s what you came here to say?”
His jaw tightens a little. “No.”
“Then say what you came to say.”
He exhales and rubs both hands over his thighs, leaning forward in the chair like he’s about to make some huge confession. “I’ve been trying to figure out how to fix this for months,” he says.
A laugh slips out before I can stop it, and Ethan’s eyes flick up to mine. “You think this is something you can fix?”
“I think we can,” he says quickly. “I think if we just sit down and talk like adults, without your family and the club and everyone else getting in your head, we can figure out where we went wrong.”
I lean back in my chair and stare at him. “Where we went wrong?”
He swallows, but keeps going. “I made a mistake, Scarlett. A terrible mistake. I know that. I was stressed, and I was lonely, and things were complicated between us. You were pulling away, I was traveling constantly, the pressure was insane, and I let myself get caught up in something that didn’t mean anything. ”
I stare at him for a second, trying to decide if he actually hears himself. “You let yourself get caught up in another woman in our bed.”
His face flushes. “I know.”
“No, I don’t think you do.”
“I do,” he insists, leaning forward more. “I swear to God, I do. I hate myself for it. I hate that I hurt you like that. I’ve replayed that night over and over, and I would take it back if I could.”
“But you can’t.”
“I know that.”
“Do you?” I ask. “Because you’re sitting here talking like the cheating is the whole story. Like if I can just get over that part, we can move backward and pretend the rest of it wasn’t already broken.”
His eyebrows pull together. “The rest of what?”
And there it is, that’s the part that hurts in a way the cheating never could. I nod slowly, more to myself than to him. “You still don’t get it.”
Ethan’s face tightens. “I know I cheated, Scarlett.”
“This isn’t just about you cheating.” I lean forward now, resting my forearms on the desk. “That was the thing that made me leave, but it wasn’t the only thing that broke us.”
His mouth opens, then closes again.
“The entire time we were together, everything was about you.” I keep my voice even, because if I let it shake, he’ll focus on that instead of the words.
“Every decision we made revolved around what you needed. Where you played. Where we lived. What your schedule looked like. What event you had to attend. What interview you had coming up. What sponsor needed something from you. Every plan was built around your future while mine sat on a shelf collecting dust.”
“We were building a life together,” he says.
“No, Ethan. I was building your life around you.”
He flinches, and for a second, I see something honest cross his face.
“I followed you everywhere because I loved you. I built my life around your career, your schedule, and your future until I couldn't remember what I wanted anymore. I spent years making sure everything in your world worked, and you never once stopped to ask what it was costing me.”
His jaw clenches. “You’re the one who wanted to help me.”
“No, I wanted to love you!” I slam my hand on my desk. Silence spreads through the room. I clear my throat. “I wanted to love you,” I repeat, quieter this time. “And somewhere along the way, you decided that meant I was supposed to disappear into your life and be grateful for the privilege.”
“That’s not fair.” The words come out defensive, and something inside me goes cold.
“There it is.”
His brow furrows. “What?”
“Every time I tell you how something hurt me, you make it about whether I’m being fair to you.”
He looks away.
I shake my head. “I got a business degree, Ethan. I worked my ass off for that degree, and every time I talked about getting a job, you had a reason I should wait. It was a bad time. The season was too busy. You needed me on the road. You needed help with the move. You needed me at some charity dinner because it looked better if I was there. You needed me smiling beside you so everyone could keep believing Ethan Hayes had the perfect life.”
His throat works as he swallows.
“And I did it,” I say. “I did all of it. I smiled. I packed. I waited. I kept telling myself my turn was coming because that’s what you always said.
After this season. After this contract. After things calmed down.
But things never calmed down because there was always something else you needed more than I needed myself. ”
“Scarlett,” he says, and my name sounds broken in his mouth, but I don’t let it soften me this time.
“No. You don’t get to interrupt this part.
” I sit up straighter. “You took me away from my family, and I let you because I thought that’s what love was supposed to look like.
I missed birthdays, cookouts, weddings, babies being born, Sunday dinners, and nights at the clubhouse where everyone else kept living while I kept telling myself I was doing the right thing by choosing you.
Do you know how many times I wanted to come home and didn’t because you made me feel like leaving for a weekend was abandoning you? ”
He shakes his head. “I never said that.”
“You didn’t have to. You’d get quiet and distant. You’d make some comment about how hard things were and how you guessed you’d handle it alone, and then I’d unpack the bag I had already packed because your guilt always worked better than asking me outright.”
His eyes drop. The room is so quiet I can hear the faint murmur of Sophie’s voice at the front desk and the hum of the fluorescent light above us. I used to hate silence with Ethan because it always felt like something I needed to fix. Now I wait letting him sit in the silence.
“I gave you years of my life,” I say, and my voice is softer now, but not weaker. “And you didn’t even notice what it cost me.”
He looks up at that, his face pale. “I noticed.”