Page 26 of Falling For My Ex's Older Brother

I look at her then, because the honesty of it catches me off guard. She meets my eyes without flinching, a small smile at the corner of her mouth that isn't calibrated for anyone in particular. Just real.

"You'll be fine," I tell her.

"I know." She turns back to the window.

The venue appears ahead — lit up, cars pulling in, the full machinery of a significant evening in motion. I watch her take it in. I watch the moment she straightens almost imperceptibly, shifting into the version of herself she's about to need. I know that shift. I do it myself.

The room is everything I expected and she handles it better than I had any right to anticipate. Somethingsharpens in her when the stakes are high enough — a precision, a social fluency she carries so naturally that half the people in this space will assume she's been in rooms like this her entire life. We move through the tier-one donors inside the first forty minutes — the Caldwells to the left of the stage, the foundation chair already tracking the aisle, the Harmon table positioned exactly where I was told it would be. Sutton reads each transition before I signal it. When I need her to hold a conversation while I step away, I return to find the donor still engaged and asking questions.

My hand finds the small of her back early in the evening — a natural gesture for the room we're in. What isn't natural is how aware I am of it. The warmth of her through the fabric of the gown, the curve of her spine beneath my palm. I keep the contact appropriate. I am conscious of it for the rest of the evening in a way that goes well past appropriate.

"She's remarkable." Richard Voss, a Dallas developer with a competitive interest in my southwest expansion, has been watching Sutton handle Margaret Caldwell for the past four minutes.

"Where has she been hiding?"

"She hasn't been hiding," I say. "She's been working."

"Smart woman." He means more than he's saying.

I redirect him to the southwest expansion with the efficiency of a hard turn. Across the room Sutton catches my eye over Margaret Caldwell's shoulder — a quick check, reading me. I give her a slight nod.Stay. You're doing well.She turns back to Margaret withoutmissing a beat. Somewhere in the second hour I stop thinking of it as a performance.

The terrace is off the east side of the ballroom — glass doors opening to the Dallas night, a row of heaters along the railing, the city spread out below in every direction. We end up there between conversations, a natural pause in the evening's momentum.

The air is cooler out here. She tilts her face toward it, eyes closing for just a second, and in that second she is completely unguarded — not the woman working the room, not my assistant, not the woman performing the role I brought her here to fill. Just herself.

"Margaret Caldwell," she says, opening her eyes.

"She's been funding the infrastructure grant for six years because her father was a civil engineer. She thinks most philanthropic tech investment ignores the physical layer."

"That's correct," I say.

"You knew that and you sent me in anyway." She isn't accusing. She's reading me, the way she does.

"I wanted to see how fast you'd find it."

"And?" she asks.

"Under four minutes."

She's quiet for a moment. Then: "You test people a lot."

"I don't invest in things I haven't verified," I say.

She looks at me directly.

"People aren't investment portfolios, Logan."

My name in her mouth, in that tone — not sharp, just honest — does something to my composure. I hold hergaze and the space between us on this terrace is not what it was three minutes ago. The heater throws warmth between us. The city below glitters, indifferent.

She isn't performing anything right now. There is nothing on her face that's been calibrated for a room or an audience. There is only her, looking at me, waiting to see what I do with the truth she just handed me.

I look at her for a beat longer than I should.

Then I step toward her — not a decision, not something I planned. One step, maybe less, closing the distance until I'm close enough to catch the scent of her perfume and feel the warmth coming off her skin. My eyes drop to her mouth for one second. Just one.

The terrace door opens behind me.

I turn. The Nakamura contact is crossing toward us through the glass doors and I have my exit and I take it.