"How long were you together?"
"Fourteen years. Married for twelve." He pauses. "She got sick about eight years in. Fought it for as long as she could."
I do the math in my head. Six years of illness. Five years since she died. More than a third of their marriage spent fighting.
"I don't know how you did it," I say. "How you stayed."
"I loved her." He says it simply, like it explains everything. Maybe it does. "And she needed me. What kind of man would I be if I walked away from someone who needed me?"
The question lands somewhere I wasn't expecting. Craig needed me too—needed me to reflect his ego, to absorb his moods, to be less than him so he could feel like more. That's not the same thing. I know that now.
"The right kind of need is different," I say slowly. "Isn't it? The kind that makes you more instead of less."
"Yeah." Will's eyes meet mine. "It is."
I'm suddenly aware of how small this office is. How close he's standing. I should step back, put distance between us, retreat to the safety of tax documents and numbers that don't make my heart race.
I don't move.
"Will, I?—"
The office door swings open, and I step back without meaning to. Nash pokes his head in. "Hey, Will, we've got a delivery out back and the guy's saying the order's wrong. You want to deal with it or should I?"
The moment shatters. Will's expression smooths into something professional.
"I'll handle it." He moves toward the door, then pauses. "Gemma. You good, or do you need more time?"
"I'm okay." The words come out steadier than I feel. "Go. I'll be fine."
He nods and disappears through the door. I stand there for a moment, heart pounding, trying to figure out what just happened.
Nothing happened. That's the problem. Nothing happened. I wanted it to, and I don't know what to do with that.
I force myself to move to the side table, to sit down, to pick up the first folder in the stack. The numbers blur in front of my eyes.
Sarah's photo watches me from the windowsill. I wonder what she'd think if she could see me now—the girl who used to watch her with envy, sitting in her husband's office, feeling things she has no right to feel.
Maybe she'd understand. She always seemed like she understood things other people missed.
Or maybe I'm just telling myself that because it's easier than admitting I'm falling for a man who still keeps his dead wife's picture in his office.
I pull another folder toward me and start sorting receipts. It's not an answer. But it's something to do with my hands while I figure out what the hell I'm doing with my heart.
5
WILL
When Cole tells me about the flowers, something cold and certain settles in my gut. The calm before a mission. The stillness right before everything goes loud.
"No card," Cole says, pacing the length of my office like a caged animal. "Just roses. Red ones. Expensive as hell, in some fancy crystal vase. She took one look at them and went white. Carried them inside like nothing was wrong, but I could see her hands shaking."
I stay seated behind my desk, letting him pace. Morning sun cuts through the blinds in harsh stripes, and the bar beyond the closed door is still, hours from opening.
"You ask her who sent them?"
"She just nodded when I asked if they were from Craig." He stops pacing, runs both hands through his hair. "Then she said she was tired and went to bed. Locked her door. I heard her moving around half the night, but she never came out."
Craig. The husband. The reason Gemma flinches when someone moves too fast, checks exits before she sits down, holds herself like she's bracing for impact.
