Chapter 9
REID
Dial tones no longer exist on modern cell phones, but the sudden, ringing quiet that followed the disconnected call felt exactly like one.
I stood near the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Elliott Bay, my thumb hovering uselessly over the darkened screen. My chest rose and fell in shallow, rapid movements, yet I couldn't seem to pull a full breath into my lungs. The air inside the loft had turned to ash.
Your apologies don't mean anything to me because you don't even know what you are apologizing for.
Gwen’s final sentence looped in my mind on an agonizing, endless cycle.
Her tone hadn't possessed a single shred of the fiery temper she used to exhibit back when we lived on cheap takeout and relentless optimism.
It had been stripped down to a hollow, echoing shell.
The sheer, desolate emptiness of her voice on that crackling connection was infinitely more terrifying than any screaming match could have ever been.
She had severed the call. She had muted her device. She had effectively drawn an impenetrable steel wall between Seattle and the island, stranding me entirely on the wrong side of the water.
I resumed pacing the wide plank floorboards, dragging a rough hand through my hair.
I didn't know what I was apologizing for.
That accusation gnawed viciously at the edges of my brain.
I had built an entire career on my ability to diagnose a failure and engineer a fix.
I had just given her a completely itemized list of my failures over the phone.
I had apologized for the jewelry. I had apologized for the canceled weekend.
I had reprimanded the consultant involved.
I had immediately restructured my calendar to prioritize a meeting with her.
I had executed a flawless, textbook damage-control strategy.
Yet, for the very first time that I could remember, I lacked what was required to solve the equation.
I was staring at a failure within my own marriage, and I couldn't even locate the actual fracture.
I had treated her departure exactly like a malfunctioning manufacturing line that just needed a quick operational patch, completely blind to the fact that I was actively burning the relationship that mattered to me most.
Silence within the loft was becoming suffocating. It was an oppressive, dense quiet that pressed against my eardrums, magnifying the vast, empty space she had left behind.
Turning away from the glass, I walked across the living room toward the built-in bar.
I bypassed the expensive crystal decanters we saved for entertaining investors and grabbed a bottle of scotch straight from the back of the shelf.
Splashing a reckless measure of the amber liquid into a tumbler, I ignored the ice entirely.
I needed the burn. I needed something sharp and visceral to slice through the numbness creeping into my chest. I took a long swallow, letting the fiery alcohol scorch my throat, desperate for the ambient noise of the downtown traffic to penetrate the glass and drown out the ringing silence of my home.
A soft, melodic chime echoed through the foyer.
Private elevator machinery clicked into place.
My chest tightened with a sudden, violent flare of adrenaline. Scotch sloshed precariously against the rim of my glass as my hand jerked. I set the tumbler down on the marble bar top with a sharp clink, my heart launching into a frantic, hammering rhythm against my ribs.
She came back.
Logic circuits in my brain immediately fired up, supplying a desperate, hopeful narrative.
She had turned off her phone to make a point, but she hadn't stayed on the island.
She had driven back to the ferry terminal.
She had crossed the water. She was coming through the door right now to yell at me, to demand answers, to fight for us.
I turned toward the entryway, mentally preparing my complete surrender.
I would give her whatever she wanted. I would step down from the integration meetings entirely.
I would hand the Tacoma plant over to my executive team.
I would burn the entire week's schedule to the ground just to see the platinum ring back on her finger.
Polished steel doors slid apart.
I took a step forward, the word Gwen already forming on my tongue.
Victoria Albright stepped out of the elevator car and into the foyer.
I stopped dead in the center of the living room. I blinked, my brain violently grinding gears as it struggled to reconcile the image of the woman currently standing in my home with the highly efficient consultant I employed.
Victoria had entirely shed her razor-sharp, tailored corporate armor.
Gone was the structured charcoal blazer, the silk camisole, and the commanding posture she weaponized in the boardroom.
Instead, she was wearing an emerald green silk slip dress cut dangerously low across her chest. The thin fabric clung to the sharp angles of her frame, held up by nothing more than delicate, fragile straps.
She wore a pair of strappy, towering heels that clicked softly against the hardwood, and her hair, usually pulled back into a tight twist, fell in loose waves across her bare shoulders.
Before she even spoke, the scent of her perfume invaded the loft.
It was a potent, aggressive, deeply musky fragrance.
It rolled into the living room like a physical fog, immediately overpowering and completely erasing the faint, lingering scent of vanilla that had always defined Gwen’s presence in this space.
"Victoria," I said, my voice flat, struggling to process the sheer audacity of her arrival. "What are you doing here?"
She didn't hesitate. Victoria bypassed the professional distance that had strictly governed our working relationship, stepping smoothly over the invisible boundary and walking directly into my personal space. She moved with a fluid, predatory confidence, her eyes locked onto mine.
"I saw you leave the office in a panic.” Her voice dropped an octave, entirely discarding the crisp, intellectual banter we usually shared over spreadsheets.
She pitched her tone to sound intimate, soft, and conspiratorial.
"And considering the state of your kitchen last night, I assumed Gwen finally made good on her little dramatic exit. "
My jaw tightened, an immediate, defensive flare of anger sparking in my chest. "Do not talk about my wife."
Victoria offered a sympathetic, deeply patronizing smile. She reached out, her fingers brushing against the side of my hand as she took the glass of scotch I had poured. She turned and set it carefully on the console table, ensuring she had my completely undivided attention.
"You don't need to defend her to me, Reid," she murmured, turning back to face me, stepping even closer. The suffocating musk of her perfume made my throat close up. "I see exactly what she does to you. I've watched her do it for months."
She reached up, trailing her manicured fingers slowly down the lapel of my unbuttoned dress shirt.
"I have clawed my way up in this industry," Victoria continued, tilting her head, looking up at me through her lashes with the undeniable gleam of a social climber who had finally spotted the ultimate prize.
"I know what it takes to ascend. You are building a legacy.
You are changing the very fabric of global energy.
And instead of supporting you, instead of standing beside you and recognizing your genius, she punishes you for it.
She makes you feel guilty for your own ambition.
She forces you to apologize for being exactly who you need to be to succeed. "
I stood perfectly still, genuine shock paralyzing my vocal cords for a split second.
Victoria took my silence as an invitation.
She arched her spine, pressing the soft curves of her body directly against my chest. "You deserve a woman who understands what it takes to stay at the top.” She slid her hand up my chest to rest against my collarbone, her thumb brushing the bare skin of my neck.
"You deserve someone who isn't intimidated by the altitude.
Let me take care of you tonight, Reid. Let me show you what an actual partnership looks like. "
She leaned up, tilting her chin, parting her painted lips to kiss me.
The illusion completely shattered.
I didn't feel a single shred of physical desire. I didn't feel tempted. I didn't feel flattered.
I felt an immediate, visceral, sickening repulsion.
I looked down at the woman pressing herself against me, and I didn't see a lover.
I didn't see a partner. I saw a brilliant, calculating villain.
She was a succubus in a silk dress. She was attempting to cheat her way to the very apex of the corporate hierarchy by exploiting a perceived weakness in my personal life.
That staggering reality that this consultant actually viewed herself as a viable replacement for my wife genuinely nauseated me.
Before her lips could even brush my jaw, my hands snapped up. I caught both of her wrists in a vice-like grip, my fingers digging hard into her delicate bones.
Victoria gasped, a brief flash of triumph in her eyes, assuming I was pulling her closer.
Instead, I shoved her backward with a sudden, rigid force.
I didn't just step away; I pushed her until there was three solid feet of empty space between us, breaking the physical contact so abruptly she stumbled slightly in her towering heels, catching her balance on the edge of the table.
Her confident, predatory smile faltered. Confusion flickered across her perfectly contoured face. "Reid?"
I looked at her. I didn't raise my voice. I didn't scream.
The expansion into the Tacoma manufacturing plant was currently resting on a knife's edge, and my deeply ingrained discipline kept my temper locked down inside an iron vault.
Terminating my lead consultant on the spot tonight would trigger a catastrophic delay in the rollout, alerting the board to instability.