Gerald switched gears. His voice went softer, the register of a reasonable man making a reasonable request. “I just want to understand how you’re connected to my son. Given your position, I’m sure you can appreciate that a father has concerns—”
“Your concerns aren’t relevant to me.” I kept my voice level. Not raised. Not a threat. Just final. “Jai is leaving with me. His belongings are being packed. You’re being escorted out. That is the situation.”
Gerald’s jaw tightened. The veins in his forearms stood out. He looked at Jai, and something in his face shifted—from acting to something raw and unfiltered. “You’re really going to do this. In front of strangers.”
Jai’s voice cut through the room, flat and clean as a blade. “You deleted my manuscripts. Off my personal laptop. In my apartment that you broke into.” He didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t need to. “We’re a little past me worrying about your feelings on the subject.”
Gladys stepped forward. Her hands came up, soft and careful, gesturing at the apartment, at me, at the men packing Jai’s life into cardboard. “Jai, sweetheart, we came because we’re worried. We just want what’s best for you.” Her voice had that deceptive texture—warm on the surface, structured underneath. “This isn’t a life.”
Jai snapped. “It’s my life.”
“It’s a phase,” Gerald said, and I watched Jai go still in a way that meant calm was miles away. His body locked. His fingers whitened around the edge of the laptop.
The air in the room changed density.
I stepped forward. Not fast. Measured. I positioned myself behind Jai’s left shoulder, close enough that he could feel my presence, but not so close it read as possessive. I held Gerald’s gaze the way I’d ended more than one negotiation without another word spoken.
When I spoke, my voice was quiet. The kind of quiet that made people lean in. “The men packing this apartment will be done in twenty minutes. You’ll be gone before then.” I let each word land. “If you come back here, or to my building, or contact Jai in any way he hasn’t explicitly invited, I will know about it.” I paused. “I know about most things that happen in this city. That isn’t a threat. It’s information. Use it however you like.”
Gerald opened his mouth. Closed it. Looked at Jai one last time, and something genuine flickered—brief, unguarded, the kind of look a man gives his son when he realizes he’s lost something he can’t name. Then it was gone, buried under the performance of dignity.
Gladys steered him to the door. Her hand on his arm was gentle, but firm, the touch of a woman who’d spent decades redirecting her husband’s momentum.
Denise made one final attempt. She stood, smoothed her skirt, and offered me a business card with a smile that had beenwork-shopped for maximum impact. “In case you change your mind about the meeting.”
I took the card. I didn’t look at it. I handed it to Ashe without turning. He pocketed it with an expression that said trash the moment she was out of sight.
Denise’s smile went fixed. She left without another word, heels clicking on the hardwood in a rhythm that said she was counting each step.
With the door closed and their footsteps fading down the stairs, Jai let out a breath I hadn’t realized he was holding. Slow. Deliberate. The kind of exhale that carried the weight of something he’d been carrying too long.
He rolled his neck once. The vertebrae cracked, a soft series of pops that traveled from the base of his skull to the junction of his shoulders. His posture released by fractions—shoulders dropping a half-inch, the line of his spine easing from rigid to something closer to human.
He looked at me sideways. His mouth curved, just at one corner. “You didn’t shake his hand.”
“No,” I said.
“He noticed.”
“Good.”
He made a sound. Almost a laugh. Close and real and caught in the back of his throat before it could fully form. The kind of sound that did something to my chest I wasn’t prepared to name.
I turned away. Watched my men work. Kept whatever that sound had done to me locked behind the expression I’d spent decades perfecting.
The smells layered. Cherry blossom, stubborn and sweet, clinging to the fabric of the couch where he’d sat. Old paper, ink, the must of a room that had been closed up too long. Under it all, the warm sugar-yeast drift from the bakery downstairs, rising through the floorboards like the building itself was breathing.
I registered, with low private irritation, that Jai would stop smelling like this place. His scent would change. The cherry blossom would layer over the cedar and scotch of my penthouse until the two became something I couldn’t separate. He’d smell like my space. My things. My air.
The thought settled somewhere low and satisfied.
I kept it off my face.
Jai was watching one of my men wrap his coffee equipment—the French press, the grinder, the battered kettle with the dent in its side. His eyes tracked each movement with the focused attention of someone making sure nothing got broken.
Without looking at me, he said, “The ‘mate’ thing. In front of my parents.”
“Yes,” I said.
