CHAPTER FOURTEEN #2
Julia was the woman whose body I could map blindfolded.
The woman I still watched cross a room because some primitive part of me refused to believe she belonged to me.
There shouldn't have been room in my head to catalog another woman's fucking dress.
So I shoved the thought exactly where it belonged—nowhere.
I picked up the Cortez file again. When Knox didn’t say anything, I glanced up at him.
Something about him looked off. The observation snagged my attention like a hangnail, small and persistent and impossible to ignore.
Knox's skin had a faint sallow quality, the kind that didn't belong on a man who'd been running at the same relentless pace as everyone else in our firm with overflowing case loads.
His eyes, usually sharp enough to cut glass, sat a shade duller than they should have, like someone had turned down the brightness on a screen.
This wasn't the first time I had caught it.
The pattern had been repeating for weeks now—Knox would show up looking like he'd been dragged behind a truck, and the next day he'd stroll in bright-eyed and rested, skin warm and healthy, as though the version I had seen the day before had been a trick of the light.
I'd asked multiple times. Once after a deposition when Knox had excused himself to the bathroom and hadn't come back for fifteen minutes.
The second time had been in the parking garage.
Both times, Knox had waved me off with some variation of the same line—just tired, man, you know how it is—and then the next morning, there he'd be, looking like he'd slept twelve hours on a cloud.
It didn't add up.
"You all right?" I asked, setting the Cortez file down. "You look like shit."
The corner of Knox's mouth twitched. "You sure know how to flatter a man."
"I'm serious."
He sighed. "I was just thinking that men like us don't get the luxury of mistakes, Ethan. One slip, even if you later regret it, your life is fucked."
I was well aware of that, so I wondered if he was talking about himself, or trying to give me unsolicited and unnecessary advice. I hated the warning all the same.
THE LIFT DOORS OPENED with a soft chime, and there she was.
Lila. I felt like I was seeing more of her lately than I had in the entire time she'd worked here. She stood just outside the lift with a takeout bag in one hand, hair down and out of her usual professional wear so she’d gone home at some point and had returned, now preparing to get on as I stepped off.
"Mr. Marcelli." Her greeting was smooth and warm, not the least bit surprised.
I checked my watch and then looked at her again. “You plan on being here much longer?”
She smiled and held the door. “Not initially, but I forgot the files I needed to go over and figured I’d settle in here with dinner. I thought you'd be gone by now. You're usually out no later than eight lately."
My brow rose slightly. "And how do you know that?"
Her smile didn't falter. "Your car's always gone when I leave."
"That doesn't explain how you know what time."
She tilted her head slightly. The movement sent a section of dark hair sliding over her shoulder.
"Observation is my specialty. It's how I anticipate needs before they become problems."
I stepped fully out of the elevator, trading places with her. Sesame and ginger drifted from the bag between us.
"If you're that observant, you should already know who you crossed today."
Something shifted behind her eyes. "If you're referring to earlier, that wasn't my intention."
"Your intentions were the right ones for anyone else but my the women in my life, especially my wife."
That erased some of the polish from her expression. Good. She excelled at remaining calm and collected.
"Julia has unrestricted access to me, this floor, and this firm. You don't question her. You don't challenge her, and you don't put her in a position where she has to remind you who she is."
Her chin lifted slightly. "I understand."
"Do you?"
"Perfectly,” she replied smoothly.
I studied her for a second longer than I should have. Most people wilted when I spoke to them like this, shoulders dropping, eyes sliding away, the whole body quietly folding inward. Lila did the opposite. Something in her posture gathered itself, the way a blade catches light when you turn it.
I knew that look.
I'd seen it across negotiating tables and witness stands for years—the particular stillness of someone who had decided that pressure was a language they spoke fluently.
Push the right person hard enough and they recoiled.
Lila never gave. She simply waited, composed, and said exactly what she needed to.
"I'll apologize to your wife," she said.
"No."
Her chin dropped a fraction—barely, but enough. "No?"
"You're not approaching Julia unless she approaches you first."
Something moved behind her eyes. She filed it away before it reached her expression. "Understood."
"And if you're struggling with a case, come to me. That's what I'm here for. Or Serena, Knox, Rafa. You're not short on resources." I let a beat pass. "You don't need to manufacture reasons to be in my office."
Her expression soured, genuinely offended. "I've never manufactured a reason to speak with you, Mr. Marcelli.”
"Good. Then we understand each other."
"We do." Her reflection remained where I'd left her as the doors slid shut.
By the time I reached the next corridor, I'd already dismissed the encounter.
The scent of Julia’s perfume would still be on my collar when I walked through the door. My daughters’ backpacks would be slumped by the stairs, their small sneakers kicked off in a hurry.
Upstairs on my desk, the Cortez file sat like a sleeping dragon, its seven-figure settlement waiting to be claimed.
Every piece of this life—the Persian rug in the foyer, to the way my youngest laughed—I had laid brick by brick. Lila Marino, with her observant eyes and unflappable composure, didn't so much as ripple the surface.
The conviction settled in my chest, solid and immediate. Absolute. And because it felt so true, I didn't pause to ask myself why I’d needed the reassurance.