"I feel like I'm losing my mind," Audrey confessed, the words tumbling out in a frantic, desperate rush. "I slept with Nathaniel."
Miranda’s hand froze on the stem of her wine glass. She didn't speak, her sharp eyes locking onto her sister's face, waiting.
Audrey took a shaky breath, bracing herself. "Twice. The first time was the night Lily stayed at her grandparents' house with Simon. And then again, two weeks ago, in my office."
Miranda’s eyes widened, a flicker of genuine shock crossing her features before she rapidly processed theinformation. She leaned back in her stool, taking a slow, measured sip of her cabernet. She didn't gasp. She didn't offer a dramatic reprimand.
"Well," Miranda said softly, a dark, empathetic humor dancing in her eyes. "That certainly changes the baseline."
"I was in so much pain, Miranda," Audrey pleaded, needing her sister to understand. "I felt like I was suffocating in this house, and he was just... he was oxygen. It wasn't a mistake. I don't regret it. When I am with him, I feel entirely, undeniably alive. But now I have to walk into a therapist's office with my husband and try to excavate a dead marriage while my body remembers another man's touch. The timing is a catastrophe."
"Audrey, look at me," Miranda commanded gently. She waited until Audrey’s panicked, tear-filled eyes met hers. "You have been operating in survival mode for two months. You were completely eviscerated by the man who was supposed to protect you. If Nathaniel gave you a safe place to land, if he reminded you that you are alive and desired, you do not need to apologize for that. You are not the villain here."
"But it’s messy," Audrey countered, her analytical brain fighting a losing battle against her chaotic heart. "It’s reckless. Nate is going through his own brutal divorce. And now I have to tell him that I just agreed to three months of reconciliation therapy with Simon."
"It will probably hurt him," Miranda agreed candidly, refusing to sugarcoat the reality. "But Nate is a grown man. He knew the risks of stepping into the fallout zone with you. You have to tell him the truth, Audie. You have to explain why you made this deal with Simon."
"And what if he hates me for this?" The question slipped out, exposing the heavy, suffocating guilt Audrey had been carrying. "I leaned on him. I let him pull me out of the dark, andnow I'm turning around and walking back into a room with my husband."
"He isn't going to hate you, Audie," Miranda said, her voice steady and resolute. She reached over and brushed a strand of hair from Audrey’s face, her touch incredibly grounding. "But right now, you cannot solve for Nate, and you cannot solve for Simon. You just have to survive day one of ninety. Take it one hour at a time."
Audrey nodded slowly, the frantic, suffocating panic in her chest easing just a fraction under her sister's steady, non-judgmental logic. She took another sip of her wine, looking out the dark kitchen window into the absolute unknown.
Chapter 22
Audrey
Cowardice is a quiet, heavy thing.
Audrey sat on the floor of her darkened home office, her back pressed flush against the cool plaster of the wall. The house was asleep, settled into the deep, velvet hush of a Tuesday night. Outside her window, the streetlights cast long, distorted shadows across the manicured lawns.
She stared at her phone, the screen glowing with a pale, unforgiving light. The device felt as heavy as a lead weight in her palm.
She could have driven to his guesthouse. She could have knocked on his door, stood in his narrow hallway, and delivered the news to his face. It was what he deserved. But her analytical mind had run the terrifying simulation, and the data was irrefutable: if she looked into Nathaniel’s hazel eyes, if she smelled the dark, intoxicating scent of bergamot and rain, or if he reached out to touch her, her resolve would entirely dissolve into ash. She would choose the fire over the grueling, agonizing work she had just committed to.
So, she chose the coward’s path. She chose the phone.
Audrey took a slow, shuddering breath, filling her lungs with the sterile, air-conditioned oxygen of her house, and pressed his name.
He answered on the second ring, his voice a low, warm rumble that instantly tightened the agonizing knot in her chest.
"I was wondering if I was going to hear from you today," Nate murmured. The ambient sound of a page turning whispered through the speaker. He sounded entirely relaxed, completely unaware that the ground beneath them was about to give way. "How was the meeting with Jerome?"
Audrey closed her eyes, resting the back of her head against the wall. The tears she had withheld all day suddenly burned violently at the corners of her eyes.
"He offered a complete surrender, Nate," Audrey whispered, her voice trembling over the cellular line. "Uncontested dissolution. Primary residence for Lily. He walks away from the equity in his agency. No trial, no fighting."
The rustling on the other end of the line instantly stopped. A heavy, charged silence filled the space between them.
"That’s..." Nate started, his tone shifting into immediate, protective caution. "Audrey, that’s everything you wanted. What’s the catch?"
"Ninety days," she choked out, the words tasting like poison. "He bought ninety days. I had to sign a stipulation agreeing to three months of intensive, joint marriage counseling. If I give him that, and I still want out on day ninety-one, he signs the papers immediately. If I refused... he was going to drag me and Lily into a year-long, bloody litigation."
The silence that followed was not the comfortable, tethering quiet they had shared over the past two weeks. It was a suffocating, tectonic silence.
When Nate finally spoke, the warmth had been completely stripped from his voice, replaced by a raw, vibrating frustration.
"Three months," Nate repeated, the syllables sharp and clipped. "He leveraged his money to force you back into a room with him."
