Page 86 of Falling for Mr. Ruthless

"Let me help you now," he says, voice dropped to that register that used to make me melt against him in darkened rooms. "Let me fix this."

"Some things can't be fixed." I begin gathering what I'll need for the night—laptop, clothes, dignity. My movements are precise, controlled, the opposite of the chaos raging inside me. "Some things can only be survived."

He watches from the doorway, his presence a physical weight against my skin. I feel him there without looking—the heat of his body, the particular cadence of his breath. The way space itself seems to bend around him.

"Where will you go?" he asks, as if he has any right to this information.

"My apartment. Where I've lived for three years without your protection." I zip my overnight bag with a finality that echoes in my chest. "I've survived Megan Ardano's first attack. I'll survive whatever comes next."

"It's not safe. Not with what she's threatening."

"It's safer than here." I shoulder my bag, turning to face him fully. "Safer than living in the shadow of your control."

I move to pass him in the doorway. He reaches for me, fingers catching my wrist. The contact burns like a brand—heat searing through my skin to something deeper, something I've tried to cauterize with years of distance.

"Chanel. Please."

I look down at his hand on my skin. Four years ago, that touch could undo me. Could make me forget every principle, every boundary. Could make me believe that love was enough to overcome what separated us.

Now it just feels like trespass.

"Let go."

He releases me instantly, fingers uncurling as if my skin has scalded him. Physical boundaries, at least, he still respects.

I walk toward the elevator, each step measured, controlled. Everything inside me trembles, but I won't let him see it. Won't give him that vulnerability. Not again.

"This time, I was honest," he calls after me, voice pitched low enough that I could pretend not to hear if I wanted to.

I pause, hand on the elevator call button. Don't turn.

"Honesty after damage isn't redemption, Jakob." My voice barely carries across the distance between us. "It's just another way to make yourself feel better about what you've done."

I step into the elevator, watching his reflection in the polished doors as they slide closed—a man going still with the particular stillness of predators and broken things. Only whenI'm sealed away from his gaze do I finally exhale, a sound like something tearing loose inside my chest.

The descent feels like falling.

* * *

I check on Jaden first when I get home, finding him curled on his side, one arm flung above his head—just like his father sleeps. The resemblance hits like a physical blow tonight. The curve of his mouth, the fan of dark lashes against brown skin. Jakob's features softened through mine, a living testament to what we once created together.

I find Latanya's note tucked into Jaden's backpack, alongside a small container of homemade cookies. She must have slipped it in before leaving:

Haven't seen your face in weeks, stranger. Coffee dates don't cancel themselves, you know. Jaden says you've been "working at Dad's" but your eyeslook tired. Whatever storm you're weathering, I've got an umbrella big enough for two.Miss you. Love you. P.S. I'm just a call away. Day or night.

I trace her looping handwriting, gratitude a knife-edge in my throat. One person who wants nothing from me but friendship.

I pour wine into a glass that catches the city lights through my window. My apartment feels smaller after weeks in Jakob's penthouse—less sleek, more lived-in. But it's mine. Built with my choices, my compromises, my refusal to let his leaving define me.

The night air on my balcony carries the first hint of autumn chill. Below, Manhattan continues its relentless rhythm, indifferent to the small apocalypses playing out in apartments across its grid. How many other women stand on balconies tonight, holding themselves together with nothing but practice and pride?

The glass door slides open behind me. I don't turn, don't need to. My body recognizes the particular cadence of hisfootsteps, the shift in air pressure that signals his presence. The scent that reaches me before his voice does—sandalwood and cedar, and something darker, something that belongs to memory rather than the present.

"You shouldn't be here," I say, still facing the city.

"I know."

His voice comes from closer than expected, intimate in the darkness. I turn to find him standing at the threshold of the balcony, hands in his pockets. He's changed from his suit into dark jeans and a charcoal henley that clings to the body I once knew better than my own. The casual clothes make him look more dangerous somehow. More like the man I married than the CEO I've been auditing.