It wasn't until three hours later, when the house was silent and Simon was deeply asleep beside her, that the feeling returned.
It was a small, insistent itch at the back of her mind. A tiny, mathematical certainty that refused to be silenced by guilt or love.
He never handed over the phone.
Chapter 2
Simon
The fluorescent lights of the Lumière Events office felt like ice picks driving directly into Simon’s temples.
It was 8:30 AM on Thursday, and the post-gala high that usually hummed through the bullpen was entirely absent for him. Sitting behind the closed glass door of his office, Simon hadn’t touched the stack of invoices on his desk or the black coffee growing cold at his elbow.
Instead, he was staring at his phone.
His heart was hammering a frantic, uneven rhythm against his ribs, just like it had in the car the night before. He had survived. He had looked at Audrey—the woman he had built his entire world around—and used every ounce of his professional charm and their shared history to manipulate his way out of a corner.
He felt physically sick. The guilt was a heavy, rotting thing in his stomach.
With trembling fingers, Simon unlocked his phone. He went straight to the settings, his thumb hovering over the passcode menu. He changed it from Audrey’s birth year to arandom sequence of six numbers he knew she would never guess.
Then, he opened his messages.
The thread with Emily sat at the top. There were no explicit photos, no blatant declarations of love—it was mostly logistics, inside jokes, and the insidious, slow slide of boundary-crossing that had culminated in the hotel room after the floral vendor crisis two weeks ago.
He highlighted the thread. He hit Delete.
Are you sure you want to permanently delete this conversation? the screen prompted.
Simon closed his eyes, swallowed the bile rising in his throat, and tapped Yes.
Just as the screen cleared, his office door clicked open. Simon nearly dropped the phone, his head snapping up.
Emily stood in the doorway, holding two fresh lattes in cardboard carriers. She looked infuriatingly rested, dressed in a sharp beige blazer and dark denim, her hair pulled back into a sleek, professional ponytail. She looked like exactly what she was: an ambitious, talented associate director ready to conquer the day.
She also looked completely unfazed by the near-disaster of the previous night.
"Good morning, boss," Emily said brightly, slipping into the office and letting the door click shut behind her. She set a latte on his desk, right over an invoice. "I brought you the good stuff. You looked like you needed it when you bolted last night."
Simon shoved his phone into his jacket pocket. "Emily. You can't just walk in here with the door closed."
Emily blinked, her smile faltering just a fraction before returning, a little tighter this time. "It’s a glass wall, Si. Everyonecan see we’re just having coffee. Relax. You’re wound tighter than a snare drum." She leaned against the edge of his desk, crossing her ankles. "So. The wife."
Simon stiffened. "Don't."
"I'm just saying," Emily continued, waving a manicured hand dismissively. "She's very... intense. I can see why you're so stressed all the time, if that's the energy you go home to. She analyzed my outfit like I was a bug under a microscope."
"I said don't, Emily," Simon said, his voice dropping to a harsh, commanding whisper that he rarely used. He stood up, pushing his chair back so sharply it hit the credenza. "You don't get to talk about Audrey. You don't know her."
Emily’s playful demeanor finally cracked. She stood up straight, crossing her arms. "Wow. Okay. Message received. I was just trying to lighten the mood. You were the one who told me you felt invisible at home, remember?"
The words hit him like a slap. He had said that. In a moment of exhausted weakness, drowning in the pressure of his job and the chilling distance of his marriage, he had let this woman stroke his ego and validate his self-pity. He had opened the door, and now the entire house was catching fire.
"Last night was a mistake," Simon said, forcing himself to look her in the eye. He needed to be clear. He needed to end this before it destroyed the only thing that actually mattered to him. "The way you acted around her. The touching. The nickname. You nearly blew up my entire life."
Emily’s eyes flashed, her chin tilting up defensively. "I was treating you the way I always treat you. You're the one who got spooked because your wife actually showed up for once."
"It's over, Emily," Simon said, the words tumbling out of him, sharp and final. He felt a sudden, desperate rush of adrenaline. "What happened between us... the hotel. It was thebiggest mistake of my life. It was a lapse in judgment, and it is never happening again. From now on, our relationship is strictly professional. If you can't handle that, I'll have David reassign you to the Miller account."
