Page 26 of Falling for Mr. Ruthless (The Rules We Break #1)

TWELVE

WHAT WE COULD BE

JAKOB

I watch them from the doorway.

Chanel and Jaden bent over the kitchen counter, flour dusting their hands, laughter hanging in the air between them. She guides his fingers as he crimps the edge of the pie crust, her patience infinite where mine would fracture.

The morning light catches in her hair, loose today, falling around her shoulders in waves that I want to touch.

This is what I gave up. What I walked away from. What I destroyed with the arrogance of a man who thought he could compartmentalize love like a business division to be restructured.

I step back, unnoticed.

This truth ambushes me—seeing what was stolen by my choices, what could exist again if we survive this storm, what my soul still yearns for despite everything.

Emotions I've kept contained since the divorce rage within me. I alone bear responsibility for this destruction. It was my doing.

Three days since I had her on the couch. Three days of careful choreography around Jaden. Three days of stolen glances and accidental touches, and the weight of everything unsaid hanging between us.

Three days of playing at family while Megan remains in the shadows.

My phone vibrates in my pocket. Collins, my head of security.

"Nothing?" I ask without preamble, voice low enough not to carry.

"Sorry, boss. It's like she's disappeared. Her accounts haven't been touched. No credit card activity. No property transactions. The private investigator hit dead ends at every turn."

I exhale slowly through my nose, the familiar pressure building at the base of my skull. "Keep looking. Double the resources if necessary."

"Already did. But I'm telling you—she doesn't want to be found."

"Everyone can be found." I end the call, jaw tight with frustration.

Megan's disappearance isn't random. It's calculated, deliberate—timed perfectly with the White Glove Pivot and Chanel's return to my life. The coincidence too perfect to be accident. The threat implied but not yet realized.

Jaden's laughter pulls me from the darkness of my thoughts. I turn back to the kitchen, to this new normal we're creating that feels simultaneously foreign and achingly familiar.

"Dad!" He spots me, face lighting up with the uncomplicated joy that only children possess. "We're making Grandma's apple pie! Come help!"

I move toward them, slipping into the space Chanel creates beside her. Close enough to feel her heat, to catch the scent of her shampoo—vanilla and something darker, richer—but not touching. Never touching when Jaden might see. Another unspoken rule in our fragile arrangement.

"I'm just quality control," I say, reaching for a slice of apple. "Your mom's the expert."

"You were always good at eating it, not making it," Chanel says, the corner of her mouth lifting in a half-smile that carries memories of Sunday mornings and late-night desserts and moments I forfeited the right to claim.

"My talents lie elsewhere." The words emerge more suggestive than intended, a current passing between us that has nothing to do with pie.

Her eyes meet mine, a flash of heat quickly banked. "Indeed they do."

Jaden, oblivious to the subtext, happily continues crimping dough. "Mom says we're going to the aquarium tomorrow. All of us!"

I raise an eyebrow at Chanel, who shrugs slightly. "I might have mentioned it was a possibility."

"The aquarium." I nod, decision forming. "And maybe the park after. Make a day of it."

"Really?" Jaden's eyes widen, hope raising his voice half an octave. "The whole day? Together?"

The emphasis on that last word— together —slices through me, exposing the cost of our separation in a single syllable. The innocence of his excitement a rebuke to the choices I made. The man I've been.

"The whole day," I confirm, eyes finding Chanel's. "Maybe the whole weekend."

Something shifts in her expression—surprise, wariness, a hint of the same hope I hear in our son's voice. "Don't you have meetings?"

"They can wait." Words that would shock my team.

Chanel’s eyes narrow slightly, assessing me with the precision I've both admired and resented. Searching for the catch, the agenda, the strategy behind the surrender.

But there is none. Just fatigue. Just the hollowness of hunting shadows while what matters stands in front of me, covered in flour and fragile possibility.

"I think that sounds perfect," she says finally, her voice soft with something I don't dare name.

Jaden whoops, flour billowing as he throws his arms up in celebration. "Can we get ice cream, too? And go to the big lawn with the kites?"

"All of it," I promise, meaning more than he understands. "Everything."

* * *

Jaden has fallen asleep on the drive home, exhaustion claiming him after hours of darting through aquarium exhibits, racing down park paths, and devouring ice cream with the single-minded focus unique to nine-year-old boys.

Chanel glances at him in the rearview mirror, smile softening her face. "He hasn't done that since he was little."

"Done what?"

"Fallen asleep in the car. He always fought it, even as a baby. Too afraid he'd miss something." Her voice carries the weight of a thousand moments I wasn't present for. A thousand battles fought alone. A thousand victories celebrated without me.

I adjust the mirror to see him better—head tilted against the window, mouth slightly open, limbs sprawled in the boneless abandon of childhood. My chest aches with something that feels dangerously like happiness. Like peace.

"He had a good day," I say, the understatement deliberate. Calculated. Safer than admitting I did too.

"We all did." Her hand reaches across the console, fingers brushing mine before retreating. The brief contact electric. Forbidden. Necessary.

We drive in silence for several miles, the weight of everything unsaid filling the space between us. The facade of co-parents on a family outing growing thinner with each glance, each almost-touch, each shared memory of our son that bridges the gap between what we were and what we are.

"I've missed this," she says finally, voice barely audible over the hum of tires on asphalt. "Not just for him. For me."

The admission costs her. I can see it in the tightening of her fingers in her lap, the slight lift of her chin—a gesture I've cataloged over years of watching her prepare for difficult conversations.

"So have I."

She doesn't respond, but her exhale shudders slightly, a tell I recognize from quieter, darker moments. From whispered confessions in bed. From arguments that ended with surrender rather than victory.

When we reach the penthouse, I lift Jaden from the backseat, his weight substantial against my chest. He stirs but doesn't wake, arms instinctively circling my neck, face burrowing against my shoulder.

Chanel walks ahead, unlocking doors, turning on soft lights, creating a path through darkness with the efficient grace that defines her.

I follow, carrying our son to his room, lowering him onto sheets she turns down without our needing to coordinate.

A choreography of parenthood we once performed nightly, now unfamiliar but not forgotten.

She removes his shoes while I pull off his jacket.

She grabs his pajamas while I find his favorite stuffed tiger, hidden beneath pillows with the self-consciousness of a boy caught between childhood and something more.

We move around each other in the small space without touching, without speaking, united in purpose if nothing else.

When he's settled, face peaceful in sleep, we step back into the hallway. Close his door with practiced quiet. Stand in the sudden silence, proximity humming between us like current.

"Thank you," she says, eyes on the floor between us. "For today. For him."

"Don't." My voice rougher than intended. "Don't thank me for being his father."

Her gaze lifts, something flashing in the depths that might be anger, might be hurt, might be recognition. "I wasn't. I was thanking you for being present. For giving him what he needed. There's a difference."

The rebuke lands like it's meant to at my feet. I incline my head, accepting it without defense. "He's not the only one who needed today."

"No," she agrees softly. "He's not."

The admission hangs between us, fragile as smoke.

I step closer, hand lifting to brush a strand of hair from her face, fingers lingering against her cheek.

She doesn't move away, doesn't step into the touch.

Just watches me with eyes that have seen too much of who I am to be deceived by who I pretend to be.

"You look tired," I say, thumb tracing the shadow beneath her eye.

"Exhausted," she admits with a small laugh. "I forgot how much energy he has."

"Let me run you a bath." The offer emerges without calculation, without agenda. Simply the recognition of what she needs, what I can provide. "The big tub in the master. Salts. Candles. The works."

Her eyebrow lifts slightly, wariness returning. "Jakob?—"

"Just a bath," I clarify, hand dropping from her face. "Nothing more. You take care of everyone else. Let me take care of you for once."

Something complicated moves across her features—suspicion giving way to consideration, to tentative acceptance. "Alright."

Twenty minutes later, I light the last candle, setting it on the marble edge of the tub where steam rises from water scented with lavender and sandalwood. Her favorite combination, remembered from nights when she'd sink into heat and emerge flushed, relaxed, ready for my touch.

I check the temperature once more, adjust the towels folded nearby, straighten unnecessary details to delay the moment I'll need to leave. To give her this space. This small luxury.

A soft knock at the door stops me. I turn to find her leaning against the frame, watching me with an expression I can't quite parse.

"It's ready," I say unnecessarily.

"I see that." She steps inside, closing the door behind her but not advancing further. "You remembered."