Chapter 3

My flat reply cut him short.

As I hung up, the car was just pulling through the gates of the villa community.

I stepped out of the car and into the foyer, my phone buzzing nonstop. It was Ryder's company's internal Slack channel.

When I opened it, the unread messages had already piled into the triple digits.

The latest post was a photo from Blair: Ryder, sleeves rolled up, kneeling on the bathroom floor to fix her new shower head.

The caption read: "Where can you find such a considerate boss! I'd happily give my life to this job!"

It was followed by a flood of envy and compliments from the entire group of colleagues.

"I've never seen the big boss like this. Isn't he supposed to have extreme germaphobia? You can't tell at all!"

"Oh my god, a man out of a bespoke suit is so sexy! You can feel the testosterone through the screen. Deadly. I'm officially a fan."

"Dream on. The future Mrs. Boss posted that. We're just here to clock in and clock out."

When Ryder was just starting out and struggling, I was the one who handled all his miscellaneous affairs, unpaid.

That was until he hired Blair, who completely took over my role. As for this internal channel, I had forgotten to leave it.

I read through every single comment before clearing the chat history and clicking "Leave."

Since I had already decided to go, getting a preview of their married life wasn't as painful as I had imagined.

But for a moment, I was transported back seven years. When he was starting from scratch, he would constantly show off little moments of our life together in the group chat.

In those candid photos, I was either making him a Mancini espresso or hunched over, organizing his files.

There wasn't a single person in the company who didn't know the boss's intentions.

Wrapped in that fervent, possessive love, even the most tedious start-up period felt incredibly sweet.

His ostentatious affection had turned the otherwise dull work chat into the corner everyone loved to watch.

But all of that changed the day Blair arrived.

She took over all my roles. Including being the object of his public affections.

Ryder began to subtly forbid his staff from mentioning anything about me at the company. He quietly favored his new assistant.

Ryder had once docked an entire year's bonus from a manager I was friendly with, just for complaining that Blair was impulsive and not as composed as I was.

In the end, I had to privately cover the difference from my own funds to appease the furious manager.

Returning to this villa where I had lived for seven years, a place that was never truly mine, I began to pack my belongings.

While clearing out a drawer, I found a custom, vintage-style leather album. I held it in my hands and slowly flipped it open on the leather sofa.

It documented every gift Ryder had promised and given me over the past seven years.

Seven years ago, he had pressed me against a wall, swearing that once he filled all one hundred pages with our memories, we would exchange vows at the altar.

This thick album was filled, all but for the very last empty page.

We both knew what was missing. And now, I knew that my ring finger would never wear anything he gave me.

In the end, this final step had become the most ridiculous joke of all.

I took the album to the living room and threw it directly into the roaring fireplace.

I watched as the expensive leather curled and twisted in the flames, slowly turning to ash.

Along with my seven absurd years of fantasy, it all burned away.

Ryder walked in just in time to see this, his face instantly turning pale.

He charged over like a madman, shoved me hard onto the carpet, and plunged his bare hands into the scorching fireplace.

But the flames licked at the back of his hands, instantly searing his knuckles raw.

It was already burned, Ryder. There was nothing left to save.

He turned his head in frustration, his eyes bloodshot, watching the flames rapidly consume our past.

"Why did you burn it?" he finally yelled. "Olivia, are you insane? That was seven years of our memories, and you just destroyed it all!"