Page 136 of Code of Heart

For the next couple of hours, true to his word, but with the dramatic air of a man on death row, Levi prepared the soup as she read off the ingredients and instructions.

Aurelia sat propped up against the back of a nearby stool, her injured foot resting on the stool beside her, swaddled in blankets and surrounded by pillows like a queen overseeing her reluctant servant.

From the moment the ingredients hit the simmering pot, Levi eyed the concoction with blatant repulsion and suspicion, shooting it wary glances like it might leap out and attack him.

But the true betrayal came when Aurelia instructed him to add whole, cracked eggs into the broth.

His face went ashen.

In a cruel but completely fitting twist of fate, she had completely forgotten he also hated eggs.

Aurelia covered her mouth, trying not to laugh, as Levi stood there with the eggs in his hands like they were live grenades. She totally lost her composure when Levi gagged as he cracked the eggs into the pot.

In between his culinary suffering, their conversation became more serious. They talked more about everything that happened over the last several days.

“I’ve been thinking…” Levi began darkly, glaring at the package of chouriço as if it had personally wronged him. “If it’s alright with you, I’d like to finish the second floor. There’s more than enough space above the garage for three, maybe four smallbedrooms and a full bath. Possibly use some of the space for that office you’ve been dreaming about…maybe even a drum set.”

His mood visibly darkened as he tore into the chouriço with far more aggression than the task required.

“I’ve got a lot of time on my hands now,” he muttered. “Might as well do something productive.”

The mention of time—and what it had cost him—hit Aurelia like a punch to the chest, bringing back everything that had happened at Neuronix.

For days, everyone had been focused on her. On what had happened with Selene. On what she had survived. She hadn’t even thought about what he and his friends had lost. Guilt twisted through her.

Quietly, carefully, she asked, “I saw what happened with Neuronix. How’s everyone handling it? How…how areyouhandling it?”

Levi’s mood darkened enough to cause the temperature in the room to drop. The knife in his hand turned into a weapon of vengeance as he hacked mercilessly through the sausage.

“I haven’t had time to think about it,” he said, his voice low. “Didn’t have the chance before…” He hesitated. “Before you served me those papers.”

Aurelia flushed with shame and winced, but Levi kept going, his tone distant, haunted.

“I sat on Isaac’s couch for hours. Didn’t move. Didn’t see anyone.”

His knuckles whitened as he gripped the knife.

“The only thing that snapped me out of it was hearing Isaac frantically looking for his car keys after Owen called. You know the rest.”

He tossed the chouriço into the pot with a little more force than necessary, then leaned back against the counter, arms crossed tight over his chest.

His eyes, usually vibrant, were dull.

“The media made it out to be a grand scheme after the extra information I gave them,” he smiled bitterly. “All of us—every founder—fired in one clean sweep. The one thing they didn’t realize is that we planned for something like this years ago. The second we were fired, our shares were sold automatically. That’s how we built it, as a safeguard. I never thought we would ever need it,” he said angrily.

“The stock prices have tanked hard, but Tyler got exactly what he wanted. Now…” He gave a hollow laugh. “There’s nothing we can do about it. The company’s lost.”

Aurelia stared at him, heart breaking all over again. The number of life-altering changes that happened over the last few days would make a regular person buckle under pressure.

“What’s going through your head right now?” she asked softly.

Levi shrugged, but it was a miserable, defeated gesture.

“I let everyone down,” he admitted in a broken whisper. “They trusted me to protect what we built, and I failed them. Failed you…failed everyone.” The memories from the last few days settled over them both like a dense fog.

Aurelia felt like she couldn’t breathe. One disaster after another. Her recent trauma was still a fresh, open wound. Their marriage teetered with fragility. His career and company were gone in a very public scandal.

The investigation at the Harvest Charity Ball was still open, and—then something clicked, like finding the missing piece of a complex puzzle.