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Chapter thirty-nine

Foxx

I watch the door ease shut behind Finn, the soft click echoing faintly in the quiet, and there’s something oddly final in the sound.

Not because he left in anger—he didn’t—but because I can still feel his presence lingering in the room, that blanket of his scent I’m constantly seeking when he’s around.

Now, all I’m feeling is the chill of his absence, standing here, trying to make sense of the fracture I never saw coming.

Behind me, Ryan clears his throat, and it slices through the moment like dull metal, grating. It’s entirely unwelcome.

“Foxx—”

“No,” I snap on a reflex. I have no interest in knowing why, after four fucking years, he’s standing in my classroom. “I don’t know why you’re here, but just no, Ryan.”

“I wanted to talk to you,” he says, and the ease in his tone makes something cold rattle in my chest.

I turn to him, desperately keeping my expression level and not snarling. It’s bad enough that I’m playing into this question I’m about to ask. “ Why are you here?”

He glances down at my desk, as if suddenly aware of the professional setting he’s just disrupted.

I don’t even want to know how he knew where to find me.

He doesn’t know about Eugene, so that’s not possible.

How did he know I was here? It’s a very insignificant question in the grand scheme of what’s going on right now, but it’s not one I can let go.

“How did you find me, Ryan?”

He sighs, looking away from me. “I remembered your password for your email, which showed me your calendar.”

What. The. Fuck.

“My fucking emails?” My vision goes red around the edges. I’m not an angry guy typically, but something about the fact that he chased off Finn without so much as a few words, and that he’s here at all, has me huffing like a bull ready to charge.

I’m sure I changed that, or at least had some kind of security setup that should’ve told me?

I pull out my phone and, sure enough, two hours ago, right before I left the house, there’s a notification saying I’d logged in from some unknown device.

Well, fuck. I haven’t checked my emails because I’ve been at work.

“You had no fucking right to do that,” I seethe, my grip tightening around my phone.

“Not here.” He reaches out to me, but I pull my hand away before he gets too close. “Let’s go somewhere else. Please.”

And maybe I should say no, should tell him that showing up like this doesn’t deserve a conversation, that he had his chance and lost it, but I find myself nodding, not because he’s earned my time, but because I can’t stomach the idea of this unfolding in a place where I still need to be a measured, collected, professional, even for a short time left at OCC.

I’ve already pushed the boundaries tonight by kissing Finn in here; I don’t need to have an argument plastered on these walls too.

So I lead the way, wordless and wound tight, like a fucking jack-in-the-box ready to explode.

“Follow me. It’s too late for the coffee shops. You’ll have to come back to my place.” I fucking hate that, and I certainly don’t miss the little smirk he tries to bite back. He doesn’t belong in my apartment, Finn does. Ryan can talk, I can hear him out once and for all, but I’m done.

He follows in his fancy new car that sets my teeth on edge for reasons I can’t quite name.

Maybe because he’d never have spent money on a car like that when we were married.

And yeah, I know it’s superficial, but it pisses me off anyway.

I drive fast, half hoping I’ll lose him at a stop sign, but no such luck.

That shiny piece of tech probably tracks me anyway.

By the time we pull up to his place, my hands ache from gripping the wheel too hard.

I park, engine still ticking beneath me, and sit there for a beat too long.

I want to feel in control. I want to pretend that he’s not parked behind me and that I’m going to walk inside my door and find the one person I want to be there.

But I know that’s just my desire to control this talking. Instead, I take a breath, straighten my spine, and step out of the car.

Inside my apartment, I drop my keys onto the counter with more force than necessary. He doesn’t sit, and I don’t offer him a drink or a place to hang his coat; he doesn’t deserve either. I’m not crazy about making him comfortable here because I’m sure as hell not.

“What do you want?” My voice is steady, but there’s no warmth in it, none left to offer him.

“Straight to it, then.” He sighs. As he searches my face, all I do is harden my stare, a silent demand to hurry up. “I made a mistake,” he says, as though those four words could possibly hold the weight of everything he shattered.

I huff a noise, not quite a laugh. “A mistake?” I scald, my voice rising.

“A mistake is when you forget to pick up milk from the grocery store. Or when you drop a mug on the floor and it smashes. You made a decision . Don’t stand in my house and pretend it was something that happened to you.

You were in full control of ruining our marriage and we both know it. ”

He flinches, not enough for me to believe he feels any of this the way I do, that he didn’t hurt as much as I did all those years ago, but enough that I know I’ve struck the right chord.

“I’m sorry, I-I panicked, Nick.” He continues. “I thought I wanted something else. But he’s… It doesn’t matter.”

“No, say it. Tell me what you were about to say.”

He swallows hard, eyes downcast. “He left.”

A sardonic laugh bubbles in my chest at karma finding her bitch.

And that’s what it’s really about, isn’t it?

Not some late-blooming regret or the kind of aching, world-shifting love he’s trying to imply we had, but something far more predictable and far less romantic; it’s about the hollow space left behind when the person he threw everything away for walked out on him, about the sudden, unwelcome quiet that probably settled into his days once the novelty wore off and he was left to face the consequence of his choices alone.

And now, rather than sit in that silence and confront what it means, he’s come looking for something familiar, something that once felt safe, something that used to be mine to give, as though time and distance and damage haven’t rewritten all the parts of us he thinks he still knows.

Well, fuck that and fuck him.

“You’re telling me this because the person you left me for has now left you,” I say, and even I can hear how disconnected my voice has become.

He has the nerve to nod, like it’s some kind of shared understanding. Like I might feel bad for him.

“It made me realize what I gave up.”

“No, Ryan,” I say, the words sharp but smooth. “What it made you realize is that you don’t know how to be alone.”

His mouth pulls tight, jaw working as he tries to recalibrate the narrative, to twist it back in his favor like he always used to do. “I still know you,” he says. “You and I...we had something real.”

“And now I know better,” I volley back. “Now I understand the difference between being loved and being kept around for convenience. Between someone choosing you and someone only reaching for you when everything else falls apart.”

He takes a step forward, and I move away, not wanting him to try to touch me.

But I feel it all the same—the way the space in the room shrinks, the way the air thickens with the weight of what he’s trying to claw back.

“You’re seeing someone,” he says, eyebrow lifting. “That guy…he’s a student, isn’t he?”

I say nothing, but I don’t need to. He sees it in my face, I’m sure.

His eyes narrow. “How long before the university finds out?”

“You don’t get to stand in my home and make veiled threats,” I tell him, nostrils flaring.

“Oh, they’re not veiled,” he sneers. “If you think I’m going to sit back and let you—”

“What?” I ask. “Be happy?” I spin around, running a hand through my hair.

He looks at me, stunned silent for a second.

I keep going, because now that the words have started, I want them all out. “You left. You chose someone else. You handed me our life in pieces and walked away, and now you think you can come back because you don’t like what the silence feels like.”

“It’s not just about that—”

“It is exactly about that.” I don’t raise my voice this time, but I feel every word in my bones. “And don’t stand there, pretending this is some act of redemption. You’re not here because you miss me. You’re here because you hate being second choice.”

His hands curl into fists at his sides, and when he speaks again, there’s venom in it. “So what? You’re just fucking students now? That’s what you’ve stooped to?”

The anger comes fast and clean, like one hit on a drum.

“I’m not going to be working there for long,” I say, not for his benefit, but because it’s the truth.

His expression shifts. “What does that mean?”

“It means, Ryan, I know how to treat the people I love with respect, and I prioritize them in a way that you never did for me.”

And maybe I could walk away here, but I don’t. Because I want the truth to stand.

“It means I’m in love with someone else, and tonight, I quit my job so I can be with him.”

The silence that follows is absolute.

He stares at me like he’s trying to recalibrate the world, like he’s looking for the version of me he left behind, but he won’t find him here.

Because that version is long gone.

And I don’t miss him.