He exhaled. “Yeah… it could be.”
Fuck.
“He’s conscious,” Oliver said. “That’s good.” He straightened as someone picked up on the other end. “Hello?” His tone changed instantly.
Another squeeze of my hand.
“You’ll be there in no time,” Ethan said quietly.
Something about that phrasing jolted me. “Wewill,” I corrected. “You’re coming, right?”
He blinked like he hadn’t expected the question. “I have classes and work?—”
“Ethan, I own the company. You’re coming.” The firmness didn’t even sound like me—it was threaded through with panic I couldn’t hide.
He couldn’t stay behind. I needed?—
God.
Ineededhim.
After a beat, Ethan nodded without arguing. “I’m there.”
The knot in my chest eased just enough for me to breathe in again. He adjusted in his seat, the side of his body a steady pressure against mine. The contact helped, and I finally let the breath out. A shaky one.
My head felt stuffed with cotton, but Oliver managed to get someone on the line who could actually explain what was happening. The doctor said they were treating it as a possible cardiac event. He’d collapsed, was disoriented and in pain, and they couldn’t say yet whether it was a heart attack or something else. They wouldn’t call it anything definitive until the tests were done—an EKG and bloodwork to check cardiac markers.
He’d been conscious when the paramedics arrived, which they said was a good sign, but they rushed him to Mount Sinai for evaluation anyway. Until those results came back, there was nothing more they could tell us.
That was it. That was all we got.
By the time we reached the plane, he’d already been taken in—sedated and being prepped for the rest of the tests. And we still had nearly nine hours in the air ahead of us. Nine hours of not knowing. Nine hours of holding myself together while every part of me braced for the worst.
The car slowed, and before it had fully stopped, Henry, Charlotte, and Oliver were already moving, heading for the jet. We followed without a word, Ethan’s hand still in mine, only loosening as we passed through the cabin corridor. The crew greeted us politely—voices lowered, movements careful, as if they were holding their breath too.
I dropped into the window seat in the larger lounge, the one arranged so we could all sit facing each other. Charlotte and Oliver took the seats opposite me. Henry settled onto the couch to our left. Ethan sat beside me without a word, close enough that I could feel the warmth of him through the armrest. After what felt like a lifetime, the engines roared to life, vibration settling into my bones as the plane began to move.
Henry leaned forward, already talking logistics with Oliver. “We can set up camp in my apartment,” Henry said. “I’ll ask them to get it ready for you. And the kids, if you want.”
“Definitely.” Oliver’s eyes dropped back to his phone, a deep crease between his brows. “I’d rather stay close.”
“I’ll get my mom on the phone and have her bring them over tomorrow,” Charlotte added. Her gaze flicked to me every so often, like she wanted to say something but didn’t know how.
Ethan stayed beside me. Quiet.
I stared out the window as the ground began to blur, the city stretching into something distant and unreal.
My father almost died today.
The thought moved through me without resistance, too large to fight.
I’d spent weeks—years—obsessing over timing. Over consequences. Over doing things right. Holding the line. Managing outcomes. Containing fallout. As if control alone could keep everything from breaking apart. And none of it meant a damn thing if you ran out of time to do the things that actually mattered.
He almostdied.
While I buried myself in problems I couldn’t fix—contracts unraveling, Elena’s measured disappointment, headlines dissecting my company and my name—I kept telling myself I could contain them. That if I pushed hard enough, worked fast enough, absorbed enough pressure, I could stop everything from collapsing.
Instead, I watched control slip through my hands piece by piece.
