The Morning After

Emma did not sleep.

She had driven home from the restaurant in a fog, her hands gripping the steering wheel so tightly that her knuckles ached. The city lights blurred past her window—neon signs, brake lights, the glow of apartment buildings where normal people lived normal lives. She wondered what that felt like. Normal.

She parked her car, walked up three flights of stairs, unlocked her door, and stood in her dark apartment for a full minute without moving.

The peonies were still on her kitchen counter.

She had forgotten to throw them away.

Emma stared at the flowers. White peonies, slightly wilted now, still arranged in the crystal vase Nick had left them in. She thought about the note: You once told me your favorite flower was peonies. I remembered.

Four years ago. A passing comment. He had remembered for four years.

She walked to the kitchen, picked up the vase, and carried it to the sink. She turned on the faucet. The water ran over her hands, cold and loud in the silence.

She could not throw them away.

She stood there for a long time, water running, peonies in her hands. Then she turned off the faucet, dried the vase with a paper towel, and placed the flowers back on the counter.

Tomorrow, she told herself. I'll throw them tomorrow.

---

At 6:00 AM, her alarm screamed.

Emma had been awake for hours. She had stared at the ceiling, replayed every moment of the previous night, and asked herself the same question a hundred times: Why did he come to the restaurant?

She already knew the answer.

She just didn't want to admit it.

By 7:15 AM, she was dressed—navy blue sheath dress, low heels, her hair in a tight, professional ponytail. She looked in the mirror and saw a woman who had everything under control.

She felt like a liar.

---

At 8:30 AM, Emma walked into Vance Tower.

The lobby was already buzzing—employees clutching coffee cups, security guards nodding at familiar faces, the elevator doors opening and closing like clockwork. Emma walked past all of it without seeing any of it. Her feet knew the way. Forty-seventh floor. Left out of the elevator. Past the water cooler. Desk on the right.

Chloe was already there.

"Emma!" Chloe's voice was too bright, too early. She was holding a stack of papers and wearing a dress that was slightly too casual for the office—a floral print that Emma would never have approved. "I organized the Q3 reports. Alphabetically. By client name. Was that right? Please tell me that was right."

Emma sat down at her desk. "That's fine, Chloe."

"Are you okay? You look... different."

"I'm fine."

"You're not fine. You're wearing the same dress as yesterday."

Emma looked down at her navy dress. Then at Chloe.

"I have multiple navy dresses."

"Emma. I've been your backup for three weeks. You have seven navy dresses. Yesterday you wore the one with the shorter sleeves. Today you're wearing the one with the longer sleeves. But it's the same dress. You didn't go home."

Emma said nothing.

Chloe's eyes widened. "Oh my God. You didn't go home. Where did you go? Who did you see? What happened?"

"Chloe."

"Was it the date? Did Liam do something? Do I need to hurt him? Because I have a cousin who knows a guy—"

"The date was fine."

"Then why do you look like someone canceled your favorite show?"

Emma opened her mouth to answer. Then she heard footsteps.

She didn't need to look up. She knew those footsteps—the precise rhythm of expensive leather shoes on marble, the slight hesitation before the final step, the way the walker paused for half a second before turning a corner.

Nicholas Vance.

He appeared at the end of the hallway, wearing a charcoal suit and a face that looked like he hadn't slept either. His hair was perfect. His jaw was set. But his eyes—his eyes were raw.

He stopped at Emma's desk.

Chloe immediately grabbed her papers and retreated to her own desk fifteen feet away, pretending to work but watching like a hawk.

"Good morning, Mr. Vance," Emma said. Her voice was steady. Professional. A mask.

"Emma."

He stood there. He didn't move toward his office. He didn't ask for his schedule. He just stood, looking at her like she was a puzzle he couldn't solve.

"Your 9:00 AM is with the finance committee," Emma said, pulling up the day's schedule on her screen. "They want to discuss the Q3 projections. I've left the revised report on your desk. At 11:00 AM, you have a call with the Tokyo office. At 1:00 PM, lunch with the board chairman. At 3:00 PM—"

"Stop."

Emma stopped typing. She looked up at him.

Nick's hands were in his pockets. His left hand was touching something—she couldn't see what—but his right hand was clenched into a fist at his side.

"Last night," he said quietly. "At the restaurant."

"There's nothing to discuss."

"There's everything to discuss."

"Mr. Vance, we are at work. This is not the place."

"Then meet me after work."

"No."

"Emma."

"No." She stood up, her chair scraping against the floor. She was close to him now—too close. She could smell his cologne. She could see the faint shadows under his eyes. She could feel the heat coming off his body.

"Last night," she said, her voice low so only he could hear, "you followed me to a restaurant. You sat there for two hours watching me eat dinner with another man. You waited by my car like a jealous boyfriend. But you are not my boyfriend. You are my boss. And I am leaving in seven days."

Nick's jaw tightened. "Seven days."

"Seven days."

"And then?"

Emma held his gaze. "And then you never have to see me again."

She walked past him into the small kitchen down the hall. She needed air. She needed space. She needed to stop shaking.

In the kitchen, she leaned against the counter and closed her eyes.

The peonies were still there.

The same vase. The same flowers. She had left them here days ago, thinking she would throw them away.

She hadn't.

She stared at the peonies. Then she heard footsteps behind her.

"You didn't throw them away," Nick said.

Emma didn't turn around. "I forgot."

"You don't forget things."

"Everyone forgets things."

"You don't."

Emma closed her eyes. She could feel him behind her—not touching, but close. So close.

"Why did you come to the restaurant?" she asked. Her voice was barely a whisper.

Nick was silent for a long moment. Then he said, "You know why."

"Say it."

"Emma—"

"Say it."

Nick stepped closer. She could feel his breath on her hair now.

"Because I couldn't stand the thought of you laughing at someone else's jokes," he said. "Because I couldn't stand the thought of someone else's hand on yours. Because I have spent nine years telling myself that you were just my assistant, and last night I realized I was lying."

Emma's eyes burned. She blinked hard.

"That's not fair," she said.

"I know."

"You don't get to realize this now. Not when I'm walking out the door."

"I know."

"You had nine years."

"I know."

Emma turned around. They were inches apart. She could see every detail of his face—the faint scar on his jaw, the small freckle above his left eyebrow, the way his eyes looked almost black in the fluorescent light of the office kitchen.

"Why now?" she asked.

Nick looked at her. Really looked. The mask was gone. Underneath was something raw and terrified and achingly real.

"Because you're leaving," he said. "And I finally understand that I don't want to live in a world where you're not at your desk. Where you're not the first person I see in the morning. Where I can't hear you typing from my office."

Emma's throat tightened. "That's not love. That's convenience."

Nick shook his head slowly. "No. It's not convenience. It's the opposite of convenience. It's realizing that I've been in love with you for years and I was too much of a coward to say it."

The word hung between them.

Love.

Emma had imagined hearing it from him a thousand times. In her fantasies, she had been wearing something beautiful. There had been candlelight, music, a grand gesture. Not a fluorescent-lit kitchen. Not with peonies she couldn't throw away. Not with seven days left.

"Nick," she said, and his name felt like a confession on her tongue. "I can't do this."

"Do what?"

"Feel this. Feel you. Not now. Not when I've finally decided to choose myself for once in my life."

Nick reached out. His hand hovered near her face—not touching, just hovering, like he was asking permission.

"Then don't choose yourself," he said softly. "Choose us."

"There is no us."

"There could be."

Emma stepped back. His hand fell to his side.

"I have work to do," she said. "So do you."

She walked past him and back to her desk. She sat down, opened her computer, and stared at the screen without seeing it.

Her hands were shaking.

---

At 10:00 AM, Chloe brought Emma a cup of coffee.

"You're still shaking," Chloe whispered, setting the mug down.

"I'm fine."

"You're not fine. He's not fine. The whole floor is talking about it."

Emma took a sip of coffee. It was wrong—too much cream, not enough sugar. But she drank it anyway.

"What are they saying?" Emma asked.

Chloe hesitated. "They're saying... that you two were fighting. That he looked like a man who just got his heart broken. And that you look like a woman who's about to break hers."

Emma set down the mug.

"I'm not breaking anything," she said. "I'm leaving. There's a difference."

Chloe looked at her with something like pity. "Is there?"

She walked back to her desk. Emma watched her go.

Then she looked at Nick's office door. It was closed. The blinds were drawn. She couldn't see him.

But she could feel him.

She had been feeling him for nine years.

And in seven days, she would never feel him again.