CHAPTER FOURTEEN *SOPHIA*

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

*SOPHIA*

I didn't let him drive me home.

Marcus did that, with Isabelle in the backseat talking enough for all three of us, which I was grateful for. It meant I didn't have to speak. Didn't have to process Alexander standing in that parking lot like he'd been there the whole thirty days.

Maybe he had been. I didn't know what to do with that.

My apartment felt different after a month away. Smaller. I walked through it touching things absently, relearning the space. Marcus made tea. Isabelle reorganized my refrigerator with items she'd clearly stocked before picking me up.

"You planned this," I said.

"Obviously." Isabelle didn't look up. "You're not spending your first night back eating crackers."

Marcus set a mug in front of me. "Rebecca Torres called. The DA is reviewing the new evidence about Paulson. If they can prove Catherine's team compromised the evaluation, it strengthens the case against her significantly."

"Good."

"Sophia." He sat down. "You need to talk to me. Not as your lawyer. As your brother."

Isabelle quietly took her tea to the living room.

I wrapped both hands around the mug. "I'm fine."

"You spent thirty days in a psychiatric facility."

"I spent thirty days being evaluated. There's a difference."

"Not much of one from where I was standing." He looked at me steadily. "Dr. Reeves called me before they released you. He said you started talking on day twenty-two. What changed?"

I thought about day twenty-two. How I'd sat across from Dr. Reeves in that quiet room and just run out of energy to perform. Thirty days is a long time to maintain a careful version of yourself.

"I got tired," I said. "Of managing what I said."

"What did you tell him?"

"Everything." I looked at my tea. "Not because I thought it would help my case. Just because I hadn't said it out loud to anyone who was actually listening." I paused. "He didn't believe in the rebirth. But he believed that I believed it, and that it had shaped every decision I'd made for five years. He said that's not delusion. That's just someone living according to a truth they experienced."

Marcus was quiet for a moment. "Is that enough for you?"

"It's more than I expected from a psychiatrist Catherine's team selected."

"That wasn't her pick at the end. That was the court's independent appointment."

I looked up. "Paulson was Catherine's. Reeves replaced him."

"I know. Alexander pushed for the motion."

I didn't respond.

"You're going to have to deal with him eventually," Marcus said.

"I know that."

"He's not the same person."

"I know that too." I stood, taking my mug to the window. Gray sky, wet streets. Normal Seattle November. "That's actually the harder problem."

******

*ALEXANDER*

Victoria came to the apartment unannounced on the third day after Sophia's release.

I didn't let her in. We talked in the doorway.

"I've been informed I'm being investigated for my role in the board vote," she said. She looked polished as always but something around her eyes was tired. "I wanted to hear from you directly whether you're cooperating with that."

"I gave the SEC everything they asked for. If your role was criminal, that's between you and them."

"It wasn't criminal. It was business."

"Forcing out a CEO who went to the FBI to stop financial crimes is a complicated position to defend, Victoria."

She studied me. "You've changed."

"Yes."

"Because of her."

"Because of a lot of things. She's one of them."

Victoria leaned against the doorframe. For a moment I saw something genuine underneath the performance. Not love. She'd never loved me. But something like regret, which was probably the closest she got.

"I spent years making sure you'd never be fully available," she said. "Did you know that? Every time you got close to someone else, I'd reappear. It was a habit. Keeping options open."

"I know."

"You always knew?"

"I suspected. I chose not to examine it." I held the door. "You should get a good lawyer, Victoria. Not because I'm going after you, but because the SEC doesn't care about our history."

She left without another word.

I called James after. "How's the apartment search?"

"Three options in your price range. Which is significantly smaller than your previous price range."

"Send them over."

"Also, the Sterling Hotels board has requested a meeting. Not to reinstate you. To discuss a consulting role during the transition. Apparently the interim structure is struggling without institutional knowledge."

"Tell them I'll consider it."

"And Sophia Chen's gallery called."

I stopped. "What?"

"Her assistant, someone named Priya, called the main number. Said Sophia would like to meet Thursday at eleven. Gallery offices." He paused. "She was very specific that it was a business meeting."

"She was very specific about that."

"Quite specific. Mentioned it twice."

"Noted. Confirm Thursday."

I spent the next two days trying not to read into a business meeting. I failed completely.

******

*SOPHIA*

I wasn't ready to see him. I scheduled the meeting anyway, because ready was a luxury I'd stopped waiting for somewhere around the second year of my first life.

The gallery felt like mine again the moment I walked back in. David had kept everything running, bless him, though he'd rearranged the storage room in a way that made no logical sense.

"You're back," he said, not looking up from the piece he was inspecting.

"I'm back."

"Good. The Mercer acquisition stalled without you. And Nina Volkov's gallery picked up the Tanaka collection while you were gone."

"I know. I'm already working on the Harlow estate pieces to offset that." I hung up my coat. "Alexander Sterling is coming Thursday."

David looked up. "Business or personal?"

"Business."

"Mm."

"Don't do that."

"I didn't do anything."

"You did the sound."

He went back to the painting. "I just think it's interesting that the first outside meeting you scheduled after a month away is with the man who testified that time travel is real in open court."

"He has connections in the hospitality sector that would be useful for the touring exhibition."

"Sure."

"David."

"I'm agreeing with you, Sophia."

I went to my office and shut the door.

Thursday arrived before I was ready, which was exactly what I'd expected. Alexander walked in at exactly eleven, which was exactly what I'd expected too. He was dressed simply, not the polished boardroom version. He looked like someone who'd stopped performing recently and hadn't fully decided what to replace it with.

I understood that feeling.

"Thank you for coming," I said.

"Thank you for the invitation." He sat across from me. "You said business."

"It is business." I slid a folder across the desk. "I'm taking the touring exhibition international. London, Paris, Tokyo. I need hospitality partnerships in all three cities for VIP accommodation and event space. You have relationships there even without the company title."

He opened the folder. Read it carefully. I watched him work, the same focused attention he'd always had when something actually interested him.

"This is a real proposal," he said.

"I don't make fake ones."

"I know." He looked up. "I can make introductions in London and Tokyo. Paris I'd need to reach out to someone who owes me a favor."

"Can they be trusted?"

"Enough for a business arrangement."

"Then yes." I took the folder back. "I'll have Priya send contract terms."

He didn't move to leave. "That's it?"

"That's the meeting."

"Sophia." He said my name carefully, like he was still getting used to using it freely. "I'm not going to pretend I came here only for the proposal."

"I know that."

"Are you going to make me wait indefinitely while you decide what to do with me?"

I considered the question. The honest answer was yes, probably. The other honest answer was that I was tired of punishing him for things he didn't remember doing.

"I'm going to have coffee with you," I said. "After the contract is signed. Not before."

"Because you don't mix business with personal."

"Because I need the business to exist independent of whatever this is. I spent my first life letting everything depend on you. I won't do that again."

He nodded slowly. "That's fair."

"It's not about fair. It's about survival." I stood. "Priya will call you."

He stood too. We were close enough that I could see the exact moment he decided not to push further. It was a new instinct for him, that restraint. I noticed it.

"Thursday was a good start," he said quietly.

Despite everything, I almost smiled.

"Don't push it, Sterling."

He left. I stood at my office window watching him walk out to the street below, hands in his pockets, no car waiting, just a man figuring out what came next.