But Seth is already swiping open his phone, his expression shifting as he reads. I watch his jaw clench as his free hand curls into a fist.
“Problem?” I ask.
“The Beijing deal. It's falling apart. Our contact is backing out, and without him-” He cuts himself off, shaking his head. “It doesn't matter. Allen can handle it.”
Despite his words, his thumbs fly across the screen typing a response. I watch the transformation happen in real time-the peaceful and open man from the yoga mat disappearing, replaced by a steely-eyed CEO. His shoulders draw up, his breathing changes, and a vein in his temple starts to pulse.
I never should have suggested looking. I should have known that he wasn’t a man that could have a glance and be done.
“Seth.”
He doesn't hear me. He's pacing now with the phone pressed to his ear. I doubt he even knows I’m still in the room. “Allen, I just saw your email. No, don't offer them better terms. That's not-” He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Because they'll walk all over us. We hold firm, or we walk. It's that simple.”
I stand there in his bedroom, watching him spiral, and something hot and angry rises in my chest.
He almost died. Six months, the doctor said. And barely five days in, he's right back to the thing that nearly killed him.
I walk over and pluck the phone from his hand.
CHAPTER FIVE
JENNIFER
“What-” He reaches for it, but I hold the phone behind my back.
“No.”
His mouth quirks up, like he thinks I’m playing. “Jennifer, give me the phone.”
“No.” I end the call, and his eyes widen in shock. “Do you want to die? Because I'm not going to stand here and watch you kill yourself.”
“It's one phone call,” he sputters.
“It's never one phone call!” I’m talking too fast and too loudly, but yet I can’t stop. “It's one call, then one email, then one quick video meeting, and then suddenly you're back to a hundred hours a week and your heart gives out.”
My eyes burn with angry tears. The past and the present blur together, and all the emotion I couldn’t process as a child comes out now, leaving me panting. I couldn’t do anything then, but I certainly can now. “Is that what you want?”
“Of course not, but-”
“Then stop.” I'm shaking now, I realize. My hands tremble as I grip his phone. “You have people for this. You said so yourself. Let them do their jobs.”
He sighs. “It's not that simple.”
“Yes, it is.” I step closer, still holding his phone hostage. “You are not indispensable, Seth. Your company will survive without you micromanaging every deal. But you know what won't survive? You. You won't survive if you keep doing this.”
He stares at me, and I can see the war happening behind his bright blue eyes. The need to fix it, to control it, to make it right. The CEO, who always has the answer, always has the solution.
And underneath that, something else. Fear.
“I don't know how to stop,” he says quietly. “I've been doing this for so long. It's who I am.”
“No.” I set his phone down on the dresser, out of reach. “It's what you do. It's not who you are.”
His chest rises and falls rapidly. “Then who am I?”
The question is so raw, so lost, that it cracks something open in my chest.
“I don't know yet,” I say honestly. “But I'd like to help you find out.”
