The call that should have been an email runs longer than I'd planned. It’s nothing important. Numbers. Timelines. Someone apologizing for a delay that won’t change the outcome. I respond automatically, voice steady, mind half elsewhere. I’ve spent my entire adult life perfecting this version of myself, the one who never hesitates, never falters, never lets personal concerns bleed into professional ones. When it ends, I don’t move.
I’m standing by the windows of my home office, jacket off, sleeves rolled, the city spread beneath me in sharp lines of light and steel. Normally, this view centers me. Normally, it reminds me why I built this life the way I did... clean, controlled, untouchable.
Tonight, it feels… different.
There’s someone else here now. The realization settles strangely, not irritation or regret, just awareness.
Lucy.
My wife.
The word still doesn’t fit smoothly in my mind. Not because I don’t want it, I do, but because it carries weight I didn’t anticipate. It implies attachment. Someone who exists here, sharing my life with me, my home. Someone who means something to me.
I turn away from the glass and head down the hall toward the bedroom.
She’ll be there, I assume. Getting ready. Changing. Taking in the reality of what today meant.
I slow outside the door.
Do I knock?
The question irritates me. This is my home.Ourhome. Knocking suggests uncertainty, and uncertainty has never been my default. But walking in unannounced feels… wrong. Intimate in a way I don't deserve, haven't earned. I stand there longer than necessary before opening the door. The room is empty. The bed is untouched. Closet lights still on from earlier. The bathroom is silent.
A faint unease curls low in my gut.
I turn back into the hall and follow instinct instead of logic, moving toward the second sitting room, the quieter one, the one that is more comfort than statement, the one overlooking the river. The room I rarely use.
That’s where I find her. She’s curled into the corner of the couch, knees drawn up, barefoot, still wearing the sweater dress from earlier. One sleeve is pushed up her arm, revealing soft, creamy skin. It looks like she's been running her hand through her hair, and I wonder if that is something she does regularly; is it a tell? A reaction to stress?
Papers are spread across the coffee table, the PR folder, the contract, and another folder I recognize as Claire’s.
She’s staring out the window, not at the view, but through it. Like she’s somewhere else entirely.
I stop just inside the doorway.
I shouldn’t stare. I know that.
But something about her posture, small in a space that could swallow her whole, she doesn’t look overwhelmed. She looks like someone trying to solve a problem with no right answers.
I clear my throat. She startles just slightly and turns. “Oh,” she says, blinking like she forgot I existed for a moment. Then she smiles, apologetic and real. “I’m sorry. I lost track of time.”
“I thought you’d be getting ready for dinner,” I say.
She glances at the clock, then back at me. “Right. About that.”
I wait.
“Would it be okay if we ate in tonight?” she asks carefully. “Maybe order something?”
My instinctive response rises immediately.No.
Dinner out is easier. Structured. Predictable.
I open my mouth, but she cuts me off.
“We have the gala tomorrow,” she continues, gesturing lightly toward the PR folder. “And photographs on Sunday. And before we move into… public displays of affection and expected levels of intimacy…” Her mouth quirks faintly as she scrunches up her nose. “I thought maybe we could spend some time together. Just us. Tonight.”
I see what this is now. An offer. Not a demand.
