2. Xavier
TWO
XAVIER
The steak was terrible. The one saving grace of the evening was the wine, a vintage Bordeaux I'd ordered without consulting the sommelier. I refilled my crystal glass, carved off another tough piece of meat, and chewed because I was hungry and the night wasn't over.
Across the linen tablecloth, Eliza was fielding a work call.
She wore a tailored red dress that fit her without a flaw, her dark hair slicked back hard from her face.
Her posture was rigid. But her voice on the phone stayed calm, not letting her rhythm break.
She kept it at a low murmur that never traveled past our table.
Until she hung up and set the phone face-down.
"Everything handled?" I asked.
"It's fine," she replied, and went back to her salad.
I cut off another piece of beef.
That was the thing about Eliza. She could take a high-stakes crisis mid-dinner, kill the problem without lifting her voice above a whisper, drop her phone, and pick up her fork with her shoulders at the same angle they'd held before the interruption.
I'd watched her do it to everything—million-dollar portfolios, boardroom fights, the night I told her I was moving to New York. She'd listened, nodded once, and sipped her ice water.
It was a useful quality in a business partner.
Our routine ran like clockwork. My assistant forwarded an address, and we both showed up on time. This place had dim lighting and tables spaced close enough to feel lively without crowding us. But good food wasn't among its strengths.
Between us, the silence was the norm.
A few tables over, I watched a younger couple lean over their plates, fingers loosely tangled across the white linen.
The woman hadn't glanced at her phone once since they sat.
The man murmured something that made her laugh, her shoulders lifting and her head tipping back slow.
He watched her with his chin propped on his free hand, his eyes locked on her face.
When her laughter died down, she squeezed his fingers and didn't let go.
The candle between Eliza and me had been burning down to the wax since we arrived.
We weren't in love.
We'd settled that hard fact at the start—which was why the arrangement had lasted this long.
I'd met her years ago at a venture capital pitch while I was still getting my first clinic off the ground.
She ran a major investment firm she'd inherited from her father, an aggressively funded group, and she was famous for being ruthless about where she parked her money.
She'd done her homework long before I walked into that boardroom.
She believed in my vision, said so flat out, and strong-armed two skeptical investors into backing me. I took her to dinner to celebrate.
We slept together once—and the chemistry came up short enough that we agreed it wouldn't happen again.
Somewhere after that, we figured out we liked each other's minds and chose a structured companionship. I warned her up front that I wasn't built to fall in love. And she agreed without question, admitting that something in her past had left her guarded, too.
I didn't dig into her ghosts, and she didn't ask about mine.
We just knew each other's boundaries without spelling them out.
That shared detachment was the foundation.
And it held.
There were no blowup fights or messy complications—just two high-functioning lives running side by side and crossing without either of us giving anything up.
We shared dinners, talked about market trends and hospital politics, and then she went back to her pristine penthouse while I drove home to my empty estate.
The arrangement was undeniably clean.
But there was a void in it, a hollow echo I only felt once the corporate chatter dried up and nothing of substance was left to fill the quiet. Yet as a rule, I left it alone.
I knew that some chasms hold steady, and as long as you map the edges, you don't go looking for the bottom.
"How's the latest pharmaceutical trial going?" Eliza asked, eyes still on her greens.
I set my glass down. "The team's at sixty percent certainty it kills the cancer cells without the usual toxicity."
She lifted her gaze, her dark brows pinching over the bridge of her nose. "That's a major breakthrough."
"If the phase-two data holds up."
"Good luck with the rollout."
She went back to her meal and I reached for my wine—another gap opening up between us.
Across the room, the young couple stayed tethered. The woman was talking now, leaning across the table while he listened like she held every secret in the world.
"You still finalizing the move to New York?" Eliza prompted.
My thoughts went straight to my younger sister, Violet, and the painful stretch where we went from polite strangers to something I couldn't call anything but fiercely close.
She'd needed someone in her corner during the fallout with Simon—since our toxic parents couldn't be trusted to offer an ounce of real support.
And I'd stepped up. Finally.
Somewhere in between, she started calling me just to talk about nothing.
She'd text me a picture of a heart-shaped river stone she found on a hike.
She'd demand my opinion on which dress to wear for her engagement party.
She video-called me to show off the cover of her first published novel, holding the screen up to a bookstore display window with a breathless Look at this.
The connection turned into a vital part of my week—a comfort we'd never managed as kids.
I'd always played the golden son. I answered our parents' demanding calls, memorized the obligatory birthdays, and kept the fragile family peace.
And for years, I confused that performance with being present.
I sent extravagant flowers on behalf of parents who showed up for Violet less and less. I ran that act so long it got easier than asking her what she needed from her big brother.
But she forgave my absence without hesitation.
Now, she was getting married, building a permanent life in New York with the man she loves. They were going to have kids. And I refused to be the checkbook uncle who mailed expensive gifts from three states away.
I wanted to be there. I needed to be close to her—and be the family she'd barely had in the past.
"Yeah," I said, meeting her gaze. "The new Columbus facility will wrap construction soon. Once it's running, I can shift my base for good. We've always had the New York office. I just haven't been using it."
She nodded. "Understood. I'll go through our portfolios and see what the move needs on my end."
She traded her fork for her water glass and took a sip. As usual, she'd heard a logistical hurdle and started building the strategy before I'd finished the sentence.
We finished the meal in silence.
Outside, the night air was biting and still.
I walked her to her sedan. She turned toward me, and I leaned down to press a polite kiss to her cheek, catching a waft of her familiar floral scent.
She studied my face quietly for a second, her composure in place, then slid behind the wheel and drove off into the city.
I went to my own car and idled in the driver's seat, watching the deserted dark street.
Half a block away, a traffic light cycled red to green.
My phone lit up the center console with an incoming video call from my parents' private number.
I sighed, answered, and propped the device against the dashboard mount.
My mother's sharp features filled the screen, and she went straight at me about my health. I told her I was fine.
"It's been a while since we heard from you, Xavier," my father said, leaning into the frame.
Ever since Violet cut ties with them, they'd redirected all that suffocating attention onto me—a relentless frequency I still hadn't figured out how to deflect without making a scene.
They had one child left orbiting their sun, and they were desperate to fill the space the other one left.
They were proud people—both of them—but Violet had finally quit waiting for that pride to crack.
And now I fielded the interrogations.
"How's the hospital network doing?" my father pressed.
"Expanding on schedule," I said. "The Columbus facility's nearing completion."
"Good." He nodded. "That's good news. And you're keeping up your health? Eating right?"
"I just finished dinner."
"Good." He cleared his throat. "And how's Eliza?"
I sighed. "She's doing well."
"She's a good match for you, darling." My mother's voice pitched up. "Brilliant, accomplished, and she understands the demands of your world. A man of your stature won’t find a woman like that twice."
"I'm aware of her resume."
"We need grandchildren," my father said bluntly. "We're not getting any younger, Xavier."
"I'll think about marriage when the timing's right."
"You aren't getting any younger, Xavier," my mother said.
"Noted."
"We just don't want you ruining a good partnership," my father warned. "She's a unicorn in your tax bracket. Don't do anything foolish and drive her off."
I rubbed my temples. "I won't."
"Are you sure?"
"I'm sure." I grabbed the phone and angled the camera so they could see the dark street through my windshield. "We just finished a date. Tonight."
My mother squinted and leaned close to the lens. Her eyes raked over me, and her chin dropped.
"What on earth are you wearing?"
"A button-down."
"Oh, Xavier!" she huffed. "You could've put a little effort in. You look like you’re just out of the surgical ward."
I rolled my eyes. "I showered and changed before I met her."
"Still." She shook her head. "A woman of her caliber deserves more than a wrinkled white shirt with the top buttons open. You should've worn a jacket, at the very least."
"Eliza didn't seem to mind."
"That's only because she's too well-bred to insult you to your face." My mother threw a long-suffering look off-camera at my father. "He wore a plain white shirt to a romantic dinner."
"I heard him," my father grumbled.
"Goodnight to you both."