Chapter 2: The Ghost of Us

The boardroom feels colder than she remembers.

It isn’t the air conditioning, it’s him.

Dane Hayes sits across the glass table, eyes fixed on the digital display in front of him, jaw locked, posture military. The kind of stillness that’s more dangerous than anger. He hasn’t looked at her once since she entered, though the space between them crackles like live wire.

Rae’s pulse trips as she takes her seat, careful, measured, professional. Her voice sounds foreign when she greets the team.

“Good morning.”

The room hums with polite responses, but none from him.

She tells herself it doesn’t matter, that this is business, that she’s over him but the truth leaks through every stolen glance. His presence is gravity, the kind that pulls even when you resist.

Two years earlier

The world had felt smaller then, just a rooftop and two reckless hearts.

She remembers him in soft light, wind teasing his shirt, paint smudges on his hands from his side job restoring murals downtown. They had been broke, stupid, and invincible.

“I could love you forever, Rae,” he’d said that night, the city sprawling behind him like a promise.

She’d laughed, tipping wine from a cheap bottle, eyes alight. “Forever’s a long time. People change.”

He’d stepped closer, closing the space between them, that crooked grin disarming her. “Then I’ll love you in every version.”

And he did. Until she broke them.

Until her father’s company came crashing down and she had to choose between saving her family’s name or saving him. She’d chosen wrong.

Present

The click of the presentation remote jolts her back.

Dane’s voice cuts through the room, low and steady. “Our firm’s proposal leverages digital equity models to strengthen market positioning. If you’re serious about expansion, this is your best move.”

He’s good too good. Every word precise, deliberate, like he’s been preparing for this for years. Maybe he has.

Rae’s hand curls under the table. She shouldn’t be reacting like this, not to his voice, not to the way it scrapes softly at her ribs like memory.

When the presentation ends, her assistant leans in. “Ma’am, would you like to respond?”

She stands, smooths her blazer. “Thank you, Mr. Hayes. It’s… impressive.”

A small, collective pause. Dane finally looks up.

It’s not the look she expected.

There’s no hate, no anger just an unflinching calm that cuts deeper. He glances at her as though she’s nothing more than another name in his client list. And somehow, that’s worse.

He nods once. “We aim to impress.”

The words are courteous. The tone isn’t.

The meeting dissolves into murmurs, contracts, and corporate niceties. Rae signs off the final notes, mind miles away. She feels his presence as he gathers his files, hears the faint scrape of his chair, the quiet finality of his movements.

When he walks past her, the scent hits her first faint cedar, familiar, almost cruel in its simplicity. He stops briefly beside her, leans down just enough for only her to hear.

“Don’t worry, Rae. I’m not here for you.”

Her throat tightens. “Then what are you here for?”

He straightens, expression unreadable. “The company you sold your soul for.”

And then he’s gone, leaving silence and the ghost of everything she lost.

That night, she doesn’t sleep.

Her apartment feels too white, too quiet, the city outside mocking her with its noise. She tries to drown in work but finds herself staring at the glowing skyline instead.

Dane Hayes.

Of all the people to resurface, it had to be him brilliant, infuriating, devastatingly composed. Once the boy who whispered dreams into her neck, now the man sitting across from her in a suit that fits like revenge.

She presses a palm to her chest, the ache sharp and stupid. He had every right to hate her. She’d walked away from him the night her father made his offer: end it, disappear, and in return, her family’s name and her mother’s fragile health would be protected.

She hadn’t even said goodbye.

Now here he was, not just surviving but thriving. And worse, standing between her and the future she’s clawed years to rebuild.

Her phone vibrates.

Message from: Ethan, CFO

We need to discuss the merger. Dane’s firm just filed for the same bid we’re after.

Her chest tightens as the truth clicks into place.

He isn’t just back.

He’s competition.

And he’s already one step ahead.

Rae exhales shakily, her reflection in the glass sharp-edged and unfamiliar. The world she’s fought to control is slipping through her fingers again and the man she once loved might be the one pulling it apart.

She whispers into the dark, half to herself, half to the memory of him:

“You always said love and war were the same game, didn’t you? Well, let’s see who wins this time.”