Page 28 of For the Plot

Do you miss it?

It’s a question nobody has ever bothered to ask me and it’s one that I never entertained… until now. Because, weirdly, just that single little interaction does make me miss it.

The office is quiet again.

Most of the team cleared out over an hour ago, but I’m still here, half-finished whiskey on my desk and a report I’ve reread three times without retaining a word. The sun dipped below the skyline long ago, leaving the city awash in gold and steel blue. It should be calming. Instead, it makes everything feel heavier.

I glance toward the far end of space just outside my office door.

She’s still here.

Skye sits with one leg tucked under her, hair falling loose from whatever clip held it this morning. Her shoes are kicked off under her desk, her blazer draped over the back of her chair. She’s working—completely absorbed, typing something quickly with her bottom lip caught between her teeth.

It should be easy to look away. Especially with the constant reminder that she’s not only young enough to be my daughter, but she was my son’s…

She has a quiet intensity about her and if I had to guess, I bet most people miss it. They see the smile, the sharp wit, the almost reckless humor. But beneath that, there’s a discipline that sneaks up on you. A calm. She doesn’t need to talk constantly to prove she belongs. She just works—efficiently, thoroughly, like she knows what’s expected of her and has no intention of doing anything less.

It’s unsettling.

Not just because I wasn’t prepared for her to be this good but because I wasn’t prepared for her to fit so well into my life.

The longer I watch her, the more that thought begins to settle somewhere I don’t like. Because it’s not just her competence that’s catching me off guard. It’s the way the space shifts when she’s in it.

She hasn’t made this complicated; I have by allowing myself to watch her too closely. She hasn’t crossed any lines. And yet—something in me already has.

I look down at the stack of reports on my desk, then back at her. I get up and quietly walk across my office toward her desk.

“You know it’s after six,” I say, my voice breaking the silence.

She doesn’t jump. She just glances up, eyes amused. “I did notice.”

“Why are you still here?” I ask a little more bluntly than I intended. “You should leave.”

“Is that a threat or a warning?” That coy smile spreads across her plump lips. The ones I told myself to stop imagining tasting. Those plump pink lips that would look like heaven wrapped around my cock.

“It’s a suggestion.”

“Let me finish cleaning up the board deck and I’ll pack up.”

“You don’t need to impress me.” I say it without thinking.

She leans back in her chair, stretching her arms above her head. The movement draws my eye before I can stop it. She doesn’t notice, or she pretends not to, but I avert my gaze the second I see a small sliver of her taut stomach.

“I’m not trying to impress you,” she says. “I’m trying to get ahead of tomorrow so I don’t drown in logistics.”

There’s no apology in her tone, and I like that more than I should.

“Your call,” I say.

She nods once and turns back to the screen, her fingers already flying over the keyboard again. The glow from her monitors catches on her cheekbone, casting the softest halo of light along her skin. She doesn’t look tired. She looks focused. Sharp. Like this is the version of herself she trusts the most—the one that’s too busy to spiral, too capable to second-guess.

I understand that version. I’ve lived in it for years. Like if you can just keep all your balls in the air, your house of cards won’t come tumbling down. I don’t say anything else. Instead, I turn and walk back to my desk, reminding myself that in a few short weeks she’ll be gone and this will just be a distant memory.

I sit in the fading light of my office and languidly sip my drink, letting the silence stretch until the only sound is the soft clack of her typing and the dull hum of a city that never really goes to sleep.

This shouldn’t feel intimate but it does. It feels like for the first time in a long time, I’m not alone. Closing my eyes, I lean back in my chair, repeating the same mantra I’ve been saying to myself since that night I ran into her at the bar.

She’s twenty-seven. She’s my son’s ex.