11. Theo
THEO
I sat at the table Lena had set hours ago.
The ring was in my hand. Plain gold, smooth all the way around, no stones, nothing fancy.
I'd given it to her twelve years ago because it was all I could afford and she'd said she didn't want anything else.
A few years later I tried to buy her something nicer, something with a diamond that would catch the light, and she said no.
She liked this one. She didn't want it replaced.
The engraving inside said Always. I'd had it put there because I meant it.
I'd stood in that jewelry shop as a line cook with barely enough money in my account and told them to engrave that word because I was sure of it.
The candles had burned down to nothing but puddles of wax.
The napkins were still folded where she'd placed them, crisp linen corners meeting at precise angles.
The wine glasses stood empty. The plates untouched.
She'd set this entire table and I hadn't come home for it.
I'd been at Adriatico instead, working through a tasting menu with investors while my wife sat here alone.
I closed my fist around the ring and felt the metal press into my palm, warm from my body heat.
The doorbell rang.
I didn't move. Whoever it was, they could leave. I wasn't in the mood for company.
It rang again, longer this time, insistent, and I shoved the ring into my pocket and stood. I crossed the room and opened the door.
Bianca was standing there. She held herself like this was expected, like arriving uninvited at my door at night required no explanation.
Her coat was buttoned against the cold, her hair pulled up, everything in its place.
She smiled at me the way she smiled when she expected me to agree, and I felt my jaw tighten.
"Theo." She tilted her head. "I tried calling but you didn't answer."
"I'm busy."
"I can see that." She glanced past me into the house, and I realized the dining room was still visible from the doorway—the burned candles, the untouched place settings, everything on display.
Her smile didn't waver. "I know it's late, but we really need to go over the Singapore briefing before you fly out tomorrow.
It won't take long. Twenty minutes, tops. "
I should have closed the door. I wanted her gone. But she was already stepping past me into the house, pulling a leather folder from her designer bag like this was perfectly normal.
"Bianca—"
"Just twenty minutes," she said over her shoulder. "Then I'll get out of your hair."
She walked toward the dining room, her heels clicking on the hardwood floor with that sharp rhythm. I followed her, my jaw tight, my hands already curling into fists at my sides.
"Is Lena around?" Bianca asked without looking back. "I should say hello. I haven't seen her in a few days."
"No."
She stopped beside the table and set the folder down next to one of the burned-out candles. Her fingers brushed the edge of a linen napkin, straightening it even though it was already perfect. "Out with her sister?"
"She's not here."
"Oh." Bianca looked up at me, her expression curious now. "When will she be back?"
"She won't."
The words came out flat. Final. Like a door slamming shut.
Bianca went still. Her hand was still resting on the folder, her nails dark against the leather. "What do you mean?"
I didn't answer. My throat felt tight.
She looked at me for a long moment, then turned her attention back to the table.
She took it in piece by piece—the burned candles, the folded napkins, the uneaten food, the wine that had never been poured.
I watched her put it together. Watched something shift in her expression.
Her smile faded. Her eyes widened slightly.
"Theo," she said softly. "What happened?"
"It doesn't matter."
"Of course it matters." She took a step toward me. Her voice was different now—careful, gentle, like she was approaching something fragile. "Did you two have a fight? Is that what this is?"
"That's not your business."
"You're my business." She moved closer, closing the distance between us with deliberate steps. "You've been distracted for days. I could tell something was wrong. I knew it. You can talk to me. You know you can."
I stepped back, putting space between us. "You should go."
She didn't move. She stayed exactly where she was, close enough now that I could see the calculation in her eyes. "You don't have to handle this alone."
"Bianca—"
"I mean it." Her voice dropped lower, softer, almost intimate.
"I know how hard you work. I've watched you build this empire from nothing.
I know what you give to it—the hours, the travel, the pressure.
You deserve someone who understands that.
Someone who sees what you're doing and doesn't ask you to stop. "
My stomach turned. "Leave."
She kept coming, her eyes locked on mine. "I see you, Theo. I've always seen you. The man you are, the work you do, everything you've built. You don't have to pretend with me. You don't have to explain yourself."
I backed up until I hit the edge of the counter. "Stop."
"She doesn't understand what we do." Bianca stopped inches away from me.
I could smell her perfume now, something sharp and expensive.
Her hand lifted toward my chest. "She never did, Theo.
She's spent twelve years watching you from the outside, but I've been beside you the whole time.
I've been there for every deal, every show, every success.
I know what matters to you. I know what you need. "
I caught her wrist before she could touch me. My grip was firm. "No."
She didn't pull back. Her fingers curled slightly against my grip, testing it. "Theo?—"
"No." I let go of her wrist like it burned me and moved past her, putting the entire table between us. "You need to leave. Now."
"You don't mean that."
"I do."
She followed me around the table, her coat shifting as she moved. Her professional mask was slipping now, cracking. What was underneath looked raw, hungry, desperate. "You're upset. You're not thinking clearly. Let me help you."
"You can't help me."
"I can." She reached for my hand, her fingers brushing mine. "I understand you better than she ever has. I've been here the whole time, working beside you, building this with you. You know that."
I jerked my hand away. My chest felt tight, like something was squeezing it. "Get out."
"Theo, just listen to me for one second?—"
"I don't want you here." My voice came out harder than I meant it, louder, echoing in the empty house. "I don't want this. I don't want you. I want my wife."
Bianca flinched like I'd slapped her.
The silence that followed was thick enough to choke on. Heavy. Absolute.
"Your wife left you," she said quietly. Each word precise.
"I know."
"Then why are you?—"
"Because I love her." The words tasted like truth and failure mixed together, bitter on my tongue. "I've always loved her. That's not going to change just because she walked out. It's never going to change."
Bianca stared at me. Her professional mask was completely gone.
What was underneath looked raw, angry, wounded.
Her hands were trembling at her sides. "She walked out on you, Theo.
She left you sitting here in the dark with a table set for two and she didn't even look back.
And you're going to just wait around like a dog until she decides to come home? Beg her to give you another chance?"
I didn't answer. My throat felt like it was closing up.
"She doesn't want you," Bianca said. Her voice was shaking now. "If she did, she'd be here. But she's not. I am. I've wanted you for years and you know it. You've always known it. Stop pretending you don't see it."
"I'm not pretending." I met her eyes directly. Held her gaze. "I don't want you. I never have. Not like that."
Her jaw tightened. A muscle jumped in her cheek. "You're lying."
"I'm not."
"Then why have you kept me around all this time?
" She stepped toward me again, her hands curling into fists at her sides.
Her voice was rising now, losing control.
"Why do you call me at midnight to talk through your schedule?
Why do you let me fix everything for you?
Why do you tell me things you don't tell anyone else? Why, Theo?"
"Because you're good at your job."
She recoiled like I'd physically struck her.
"That's all this has ever been," I said. My voice sounded flat in my own ears, hollow. "You work for me. You manage my career. That's it. That's the only reason you're here."
"That's not true."
"It is."
"You're wrong." Her voice was shaking harder now. "You need me. You've always needed me. You just won't admit it because of some outdated, ridiculous sense of loyalty to a woman who doesn't even care enough to stay."
"Get out of my house."
"No."
"Bianca—"
"You don't get to do this." She stepped toward me again, but there was pure desperation in it now instead of seduction.
Her eyes were bright. "You don't get to use me for years—let me manage your career, handle your sponsors, fix every mess—and then throw me away the second your marriage falls apart.
I've earned more than that. I deserve more than that. "
"You've earned a paycheck." My hands were fists at my sides. My heart was pounding hard in my chest. "That's what I gave you. That's what you get. That's all I'm ever going to give you."
"I don't believe you."
"Believe it." I walked to the front door and pulled it open. Cold night air rushed in, sharp and bitter. "Leave right now, or I'll call security and have you removed."
She stood in the dining room, staring at me. Her face was white. Bloodless. Her mouth opened, then closed.
"I could ruin you," she said. Her voice was quiet now.
"Then do it."
"I know things about you. About your business. About deals you've made. About your wife."
"I don't care."
"Theo—"
"Leave. Now."
She didn't move for a long moment. Just stood there staring at me like she was waiting for me to break.
Then she picked up her leather folder from the table with jerky movements.
She smoothed her coat with shaking hands.
She walked toward me with her head high and her spine straight, but I could see the tremor running through her.
She stopped in the doorway. Close. Close enough that I could smell her perfume again, that expensive sharp scent.
"You're going to regret this," she said.
"I won't."
She searched my face for a long moment. Looking for a crack, something she could pry open and exploit. She didn't find it. There was nothing there for her. There never had been.
She turned on her heel and walked out into the night.
I closed the door behind her and locked it. Then I stood there with my back against the solid wood and let out a breath that felt like it had been trapped in my chest for hours.
The house was dark around me. I'd forgotten to turn on any lights when I came back from Maggie's place, and the candles had died while I was gone. I stood there in the cold gray spill from the streetlights outside and felt the weight of the silence press down on my shoulders.
My chest ached. My throat felt tight and raw. I wanted to call Lena. God, I wanted to hear her voice, just for a second. I wanted to know if she was all right, if she was safe at her sister's place, if she hated me now.
I walked back to the table and sat down in the same chair I'd been in before Bianca arrived.
The ring was still in my pocket. I pulled it out and held it up to the faint light coming through the window.
The gold caught the streetlight and gleamed dully.
The engraving was too small to read in the dark, but I knew what it said.
Always. I'd meant that word when I had it engraved.
I still meant it now, sitting here alone in the ruins of whatever I'd destroyed.
God, what had I done to her?
It was the not knowing that made it unbearable.
What had broken between us, how it had happened, where to even start repairing it—all of it was beyond my reach.
I just knew it was broken. I knew she was gone.
I knew I was sitting here in the dark trying to figure out how to get her back when I didn't even understand why she'd left.
I reached into my other pocket and pulled out the hand-written menu she'd made.
The paper was soft at the edges, worn from being folded and unfolded over the years.
It was creased down the middle from being folded so long.
There was a faint coffee stain in one corner from that night at the kitchen table in our old apartment, drinking cheap coffee while we worked on it.
Her younger handwriting was still perfectly clear—rounder than it was now, careful and even, the capitals underlined twice, a little fork and knife sketched in the corner.
She'd made this menu for my first restaurant.
We'd planned the whole thing together at that table in the apartment with the kitchen barely big enough for two people to stand in, staying up too late and talking about what we'd serve and who we'd be.
I held the menu in my hand. I felt the weight of something missing, something I should have been able to name but couldn't.
I folded the menu carefully along its worn crease and set it down on the table beside the ring. Then I sat there in the dark and the silence and waited for an answer that didn't come.