2

NADIA

Days slip into weeks, and Felix’s late nights and indifference stop hitting me as sharply as they used to. The silence in the house feels less like punishment and more like routine.

I keep myself busy, clearing out the basement, scrubbing dust from the walls, dragging down an old desk and chair until it resembles a small home office.

I even carved out a corner for Rex, the German Shepherd Laura insisted I take so I wouldn’t feel so alone. He settles into the space easily, his steady presence filling the gaps Felix leaves behind.

One of my old sewing machines rests in the corner, the metal dulled but reliable. My sketches are pinned neatly across the wall, and a few finished pieces hang beside them, brightening the basement with their color.

On the table, fabric is stacked in careful piles, waiting to be cut and stitched. The space feels lived-in already, steady and comforting, like I’ve finally carved out a corner that belongs to me.

A vibration from the desk snaps me out of my thoughts. I glance at the screen, smiling when Laura’s name pops up beside the photo of her and Mom.

“Don’t tell me you’re already at my door,” I tease.

She chuckles, but there’s hesitation in her voice. My smile falters. “Laura, what’s wrong?”

“I can’t make it tonight.”

“You’re kidding. The party was your idea.”

“I know. I feel awful, but James is coming over, and I think he’s finally going to propose.”

I pause, surprised. “Wow. That’s… big.”

“I just don’t want it happening in front of a crowd. If he asks, I’d rather it be private.”

“I get that.” The night Felix proposed was magical, but part of me wished we’d been alone. All I could think about afterwards was getting him out of that tux.

I clear my throat. “Fine. Then I’m canceling, too. I’m not walking in there alone.”

“No, you’re going,” Laura insists. “Showing up solo will do you good. You’ll mingle, maybe even meet someone interesting.”

“Laura—”

“Don’t feed me that married woman excuse, Nadia. You deserve a night out.”

I frown at the sharpness in her tone. She’s not wrong, but I’m not giving her the satisfaction.

“Actually, I was going to say I’m looking forward to it. Felix is away at a conference, so sitting at home alone sounds worse than going without you.”

Her excitement is instant. “That’s my girl!”

I laugh with her, though the sound feels thin. The truth? I hate the thought of being there by myself.

With Laura, no one would question Felix’s absence. Without her, the whole of New Jersey would know that the newly crowned number one designer is estranged from her husband.

Felix hasn’t exactly been discreet in his escapades. He seems to forget I’m no longer the quiet girl he met waiting tables in Ohio.

I’m on billboards now, on talk shows, every move I make is watched, dissected, and lately, every move he makes too.

Being seen at bars with other women isn't a rumour anymore. It’s a headline waiting to happen.

About an hour and a half later, the doorbell rings.

I glance up, startled, and hurry to answer it. My driver stands there, cap in hand, looking apologetic.

“Mrs. Carter,” he says, “I came for your ride to the party. You scheduled it last week.”

Surprise flickers through me. “I’d forgotten. Actually, I was going to stay in.”

He nods politely and starts to turn away. “Understood. I’ll head back.”

“Wait.” The word leaves my lips before I could think twice. He pauses, and I square my shoulders. “Give me a few minutes to change. I’ll join you.”

“Of course, ma’am.”

I close the door and let out a sharp breath. I’d told myself I wouldn’t go out tonight, but sulking alone over a man who doesn’t give a damn about me feels far worse than slipping on a mask of charm and enduring the crowd.

Forty-nine minutes later, after battling New Jersey’s Friday night traffic, headlights glaring like angry eyes and horns screaming at every stalled inch of road, I finally arrive.

I stand in the doorway, watching the crowd ripple and hum inside. Golden lights spill across the ballroom, dripping down crystal chandeliers, bouncing off sequined dresses, and bathing the place in an almost dreamlike glow.

To anyone else, it would look enchanting. To me, it feels dangerous, as though beneath all that shimmer, something sharp and unforgiving waits to cut.

An older man with snowy hair and a professional smile steps forward to take my coat.

His hands are deft, his eyes kind. I start to smile back, just a polite lift of the lips, but the expression freezes when another figure appears beside me.

A man.

He slides his coat into the doorman’s waiting hands, and in the small motion, his shoulder grazes mine. Heat floods through me. I inhale sharply, too sharply. What the hell is wrong with me?

I straighten, jaw clenched, ready to deliver a biting remark, when he turns. His gaze sweeps over me with disarming calm before his hand lifts, fingers brushing the corner of my mouth.

“You had something there,” he murmurs, leaning close as though confessing a secret meant for no one else. His voice is low, velvet-rough, with a teasing lilt. “I just couldn’t resist.”

I force a steadying breath. “Thank you.”

But my thoughts spiral as recognition slams into me. Twice now, first in the parking lot the day I caught Felix screwing his secretary, and now here… Coincidence? Or is he following me? And why is he standing so close, like he belongs in my orbit?

“You smell incredible,” he says.

The words don’t catch me off guard; compliments have always been part of the background noise in my life. But the way he looks at me as if his eyes are stroking across my skin, as if he’s already imagining more unsettles me.

It’s intimate in a way that no stranger’s gaze has any right to be.

I shake off the ridiculous thought that he might be some stalker. It’s a party, after all, and not just any party, but Mavis’s birthday.

She’s one of the city’s most sought-after neurosurgeons, adored by practically everyone.

Whoever this fine-ass man is, he doesn’t look out of place. If anything, he belongs here; confident, effortless, and magnetic like the room was built for him. He’s definitely not here for me.

It’s just a coincidence.

“Thank you,” I say again, quieter this time.

“Again,” he echoes with a soft chuckle, the sound rich and warm enough to curl through me.

I almost giggle, catching myself just in time. “What’s so funny?”

He tips his wrist, checks his watch, and then lifts his eyes back to mine, glinting. “I realized I’ve gone out of my way to do two things for you in—” he calculates with deliberate slowness “—twenty seconds, and now my mind is urging me to ask for something in return.”

A laugh bursts out of me, bubbling up from my belly, unwilling to be contained. “You can not be serious.”

His smirk is devastating, the kind of expression that belongs on the cover of a magazine, carved with pure charm. “I mean every word.”

“Alright,” I tease, lifting a brow. “And what would you possibly ask for?”

His gaze drifts over the glittering crowd. The room is a showcase of opulence women draped in gowns that command attention, jewels flashing like camera bulbs.

My designer’s eye catalogues the details instantly: the flawless seams, the draped silks, and the way a single cut can turn fabric into power.

My eyes snag on Mavis Archer. Tonight’s celebrant. Fifty years old and glowing like twenty in the couture piece I’d designed just for her last week. She’s radiant. And she had all but ordered me to be here.

Beside me, the man exhales softly. “Standing here with you makes me realize I don’t want to be here at all.”

“Oh.” I swallow, caught between flattery and alarm. My instinct is to put distance between us. “I’m sorry.”

His frown cuts through the charm. “Don’t apologize. Please. I was hoping you’d join me for a drink somewhere quieter.”

Wait. Did he just—?

“Please don’t say no,” he adds, tone playful but insistent. “You owe me.”

My nerves flutter at his teasing. “I just got here.”

“That doesn’t mean you have to stay. Are you a friend of Mavis?”

“She’s my client,” I answer.

His eyes light with curiosity. “So you’re a…”

“I’m a designer.”

Something shifts in his smile, and it becomes broader and warmer. A single dimple carves into his cheek, and it takes everything in me not to lift a finger and trace it.

He looks dangerous like this, too alluring, too confident, and God help me, I find it intoxicating.

“Mavis is an old friend of mine,” he says. “We can go in together, say hello, then leave.”

“I can’t.” The words escape too quickly. My fingers fidget against the clasp of my clutch, betraying nerves I don’t want him to see.

“Why not? She should know you came.”

“She should,” I concede. “But I can’t go in with you.”

Concern flickers across his face, not prying, just steady. “Why?”

I draw a sharp breath. “Because I’m married, and I don’t think it would look… ideal for anyone in this room to see us like that.”

For the first time, his expression falters. The light in his eyes dims, just slightly, like a flame bracing against wind.

“I know I should back off,” he admits, voice quieter now, rawer. “But I can’t. There’s a pull here, and walking away feels impossible.”

And the terrifying thing? I feel it, too.

Maybe it’s because on the drive here, I promised myself I’d stop caring. If Felix, my husband, can spend his nights wherever and with whomever, why should I keep shrinking myself into silence? Life is short. It's too short to live unloved.

I look at the stranger. His gaze doesn’t waver.

“Let’s get out of here,” I whisper.

His eyes widen, shock flashing across his features before he smooths it away and gifts me that devastating grin again.

“I’ll get our coats. My car’s out front.”

His eyes hold mine like he’s already claimed something he has no right to.

The noise of the party hums behind us, muffled, irrelevant. I can’t help it. The words tumble out before I can stop them.

“Why do you act like you’ve known me forever?”

He hesitates just long enough for my pulse to trip. Then, instead of answering, he tilts his head, eyes glinting with something I can’t read.

“Because some people,” he says softly, “aren’t meant to feel new. They’re meant to feel inevitable.”

Before I can make sense of it, his mouth is on mine.

The world tilts. Heat floods through me. My body betrays me, leaning into him, aching for more. Logic doesn’t matter. Vows don’t matter. Not tonight.

Not when his kiss tastes like the start of something I know I shouldn’t want but can’t turn away from and just as the room blurs out of focus, I realize I don’t want to.