31. She Stepped Too Close

The mistake Lydia made was assuming fear would make me smaller.

Fear does the opposite to me.

It sharpens.

The morning after the near-attack, the city looked exactly the same as it always had—glass towers, hurried pedestrians, the illusion of order. But I felt different moving through it. More alert. More deliberate.

I dressed carefully, not for comfort, but for intention.

Adrian didn’t try to stop me from leaving the penthouse this time. He watched silently as I picked up my bag, his expression tight but controlled.

“You don’t have to prove anything,” he said.

“I’m not,” I replied. “I’m refusing to disappear.”

That earned a slow nod.

“I’ll meet her today,” he said.

“I know.”

“At the office,” he continued. “Private. No audience.”

“Good,” I said. “She hates not being watched.”

His gaze lingered on me. “If she reaches out to you”

“She already has,” I interrupted calmly.

That stopped him.

“When?” he asked.

“This morning,” I replied, holding up my phone.

One message. No greeting.

We need to talk. Woman to woman.

Adrian’s jaw tightened. “You’re not going.”

“I already agreed,” I said.

“Elara”

“Listen to me,” I said evenly. “She wants access. Not to you. To me. If I refuse, she escalates again.”

“That doesn’t mean you walk into her trap.”

“It means I control the setting,” I replied.

Silence stretched between us.

Finally, he said, “Where?”

“The café on Brookline,” I answered. “Public. Neutral.”

His eyes searched my face. “I don’t like this.”

“I don’t need you to like it,” I said gently. “I need you to trust me.”

A long moment passed.

Then: “I’ll be close.”

“I know.”

The café was busy when I arrived. Late-morning crowd. Laptops, quiet conversations, the clink of cups. Lydia sat near the window, posture flawless, dressed like nothing in the world could ever touch her.

She smiled when she saw me.

That smile used to intimidate me.

Now it irritated me.

“You look composed,” she said as I sat across from her.

“So do you,” I replied. “Considering things didn’t go your way.”

Her smile flickered—just slightly.

“I didn’t come to spar,” she said. “I came to clarify.”

“Clarify what?” I asked. “That you don’t like losing?”

Her eyes hardened. “That this marriage is temporary.”

I didn’t react.

She leaned forward. “Adrian doesn’t build his life around emotion. He builds it around advantage. You’re a phase.”

“A convenient one?” I asked.

“A disruptive one,” she corrected. “And disruption gets corrected.”

I took a sip of water. “You mean like the lease pressure? The suppliers? The man last night?”

Her fingers tightened around her cup.

“That wasn’t meant to hurt you,” she said coolly. “It was meant to remind you of reality.”

“And what reality is that?” I asked.

“That proximity to power has consequences,” she said. “You weren’t raised for this.”

There it was.

I smiled not sweetly. Clearly.

“You keep confusing upbringing with weakness,” I said. “That’s your blind spot.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You think Adrian choosing you publicly changes how this ends?”

“No,” I said calmly. “I think you underestimating me does.”

She leaned back. “You don’t belong in his world.”

“Neither did you,” I replied. “At first.”

That hit.

“You clawed your way in,” I continued. “You learned the rules, then bent them. I’m just learning faster than you expect.”

Her voice dropped. “He will get tired.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But that’s between him and me.”

She stared at me for a long moment. Then she smiled again—but this time, it was cold.

“Let me be clear,” she said softly. “I don’t want him back.”

I met her gaze. “That’s a lie.”

Her smile thinned. “I want what’s mine.”

“And what’s that?” I asked.

“His attention,” she said. “His loyalty. His instinct to protect.”

I leaned in slightly. “You already lost those.”

Her eyes flashed. “You’re arrogant.”

“No,” I said. “I’m observant.”

I stood. “This conversation is over.”

She rose too, stepping closer than necessary. “You should walk away while you can.”

I looked her dead in the eye. “You should stop before you do something you can’t take back.”

For a brief moment, something dangerous flickered in her expression.

Then she stepped back.

“Good luck,” she said. “You’ll need it.”

I didn’t look back as I left.

Outside, the air felt cooler, steadier.

Adrian was waiting across the street, just as he’d promised. He watched my face as I approached, reading me without a word.

“She threatened you,” he said.

“No,” I replied. “She revealed herself.”

That evening, the fallout came faster than I expected.

A call from the board.

Then another.

Adrian paced the living room, phone pressed to his ear, voice clipped, controlled but I could hear the strain beneath it.

“They’re forcing a vote,” he said when he ended the call.

My stomach tightened. “On what?”

“On leadership,” he said. “They’re questioning my judgment.”

“Because of me,” I said quietly.

“Because they think I’ll hesitate,” he corrected.

I met his gaze. “Will you?”

The room went still.

“No,” he said. “But they’re expecting me to choose stability over you.”

“And you won’t,” I said.

“I won’t,” he confirmed.

I nodded. “Then Lydia just made her biggest mistake.”

His brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“She pushed too hard,” I said. “She stopped hiding.”

That night, as the city lights flickered on one by one, I felt something shift again not between Adrian and me, but around us.

The pressure wasn’t easing.

It was concentrating.

And pressure, when focused, doesn’t just test things.

It breaks them.

The only question now was

Who would crack first?