“So that’s it?” he says, his tone like ice. “You’re just walking away. No explanation. Nothing.” His eyes harden, almost like I’m forgotten already—just another casualty of the boardroom.
I lift my chin, gulping back the wreckage sitting in my throat.
“You already made sure I had no choice.”
As the doors slide shut between us, I feel empty. All I have left is a solitary tear.
I almost want to pinch myself, just to make sure this is real. Back in that room, I didn’t even have time to think — it all happened so fast. But now, standing here, the only thing looping through my head ishow?
Because the only thing I’m guilty of is bumping into Elliot. Stupidly, I kept quiet because I knew Chase would lose it. What a mistake that turned out to be.
And Chase. All week, he’s been distant. Cold. Detached. Now it all clicks into place — he knew. He knew this was coming, and he let me walk straight into it. I’ll never forgive him for that.
Frantically, I swipe at my tears, forcing them back. Stage one of my humiliation parade is complete. Now for stage two — braving my office and facing everyone while I collect the remains of my life.
The walk back to my desk seems longer than it ever has. Every step echoes through the office like a countdown, like I’m walking straight into a battlefield—only this time, they aren’t even bothering to load their weapons. I’m already done.
The silence is what gets me. No typing, no hushed voices pretending not to notice. Just the quiet weight of everyone staring. Even the ones who used to smile at me as I passed don’t bother faking it now.
I reach my desk, hands stiff, heart pounding so hard it makes me light-headed. My things are already in a cardboard box. Neat. Clinical. Efficient. HR must have packed it while I sat there watching my life get erased.
I stand there, just staring at the box until a shadow falls over me.
“Hey, Vi,” Seb’s says softly. “I’ll carry it down for you.”
“Thank you, Seb.” I step aside and let him lift the box, watching my life fit neatly into his hands.
We walk in silence, past the same faces I’ve passed a hundred times. I don’t even flinch now. What’s the point?
The elevator doors slide closed, the metal walls trapping the silence between us.
“So,” I say, my throat dry, “everyone knew.”
Seb shifts the box against his chest, his mouth pulling tight. “Yeah. They only found out today.”
I don’t ask how. I don’t need to. Office gossip spreads faster than fact, and in this place, scandal is currency. I was bankrupt the second the rumor hit the floor.
I swallow, the words scraping their way up before I can stop them.
“Do you think I did it?”
Seb glances at me, his face crumpling just slightly, like it hurts that I even had to ask.
“No,” he says, not a trace of doubt. “I don’t.”
It should make me feel better. It doesn’t. It just makes the ache sharper, the betrayal heavier. Chase didn’t believe me, but Seb does. And that says everything I need to know.
Seb blows out a slow breath. “I just... I can’t wrap my head around it. None of it makes sense.”
I almost tell him about Chase and me. But I bite down the words. Not yet. Not now. And it’s over, anyway.
When the elevator dings for the ground floor, Seb shifts the box into one hand, hesitating. His mouth quirks into the kind of lopsided grin I’ve seen a thousand times — the one he always pulled out when he was trying to make me laugh on the days I thought I’d never smile again.
“What did you expect?” he says, deadpan. “The only happy endings anyone gets in this building are the kind Mark gets when he visits Madame Soapy Hands on his lunch break.”
A laugh bursts out of me before I can stop it — almost painful with how sudden it is. The kind that shakes my chest and leaves my throat raw, but for once, it feels good.
I wipe at my eyes, still laughing, and wrap my arms around him, holding on tight.
