All Chapters of A Contract With My Billionaire Ex: Chapter 81 - Chapter 89

89 Chapters

080: Hendricks quit

Lucas' POV I was on my second cup of coffee when my boss called.I had been at my desk since seven, which was earlier than anyone else on my floor. I used to like that about myself, being the first one in. It used to feel like a small advantage. Lately it just felt like having nowhere else to go.I picked up on the second ring. "Crawley.""My office," Richard said. "Now."The line went dead.Richard Holt did not call people to his office at nine in the morning to deliver good news. I knew that. I had worked at Holt Financial for four years and I had watched Richard sit across from grown men and say things that drained the color from their faces before they even finished their coffee. I put down my mug, straightened my tie, and walked down the hall.Richard was already standing when I came in. That was never a good sign."Close the door," he said.I closed it. I sat in the chair across from his desk. He stayed standing."I got a call from Hendricks this morning," he said.I went still

081: Wedding dress shopping

Anastasia's POV Eleanor had made the appointment earlier and had told me about it with the energy of someone delivering genuinely exciting news. I had smiled and said it sounded lovely and then spent the rest of the day trying to work out how a person smiled their way through trying on wedding dresses for a wedding that was never supposed to be real.The bridal salon was on the quieter end of Fifth Avenue. Eleanor had booked the entire salon for the morning. A private appointment."No distractions," she had said. "I don't want any strangers staring. Just family."Family, in this case, meant Sara, who I had invited because I needed one person in that room who actually knew the truth, and Jennifer.I had not invited Jennifer. Jennifer had called Eleanor directly after hearing about the appointment and told her she would love to come support her cousin on such an important day. Eleanor had been delighted. We arrived at ten. A woman named Clara led us into the main fitting room, which w

082: Planting seeds

Leon's POV The office I used for meetings like this one was not my main office. My main office was on the fourteenth floor, glass walls, city view, my name on the directory outside the door. This one was on the third floor, small and unremarkable, used by visiting consultants and anyone who needed a room that did not appear on the regular booking calendar.I arrived first. I sat with my jacket on and my phone face-down on the table.The man who came in at exactly three o'clock was named Dennis Carver. On paper, Dennis ran a small firm that handled corporate background checks and due diligence. That was accurate as far as it went. It just did not go very far.Dennis sat down across from me and skipped the pleasantries."You said you had a job," he said."I do." I slid a folder across the table. "Financial advisor. Mid-level firm downtown. His name is on the cover page."Dennis opened it. He read the first page without any change in his expression. "Lucas Crawley.""Correct.""What do

083: Final touches

Leon's POV The wedding coordinator had colour-coded her checklist. Pink for confirmed, yellow for pending, red for urgent. When I sat down at the dining table and saw it spread across three pages, I understood that this woman took her job more seriously than most people took anything in their lives.Eleanor stood at the head of the table looking like she had been awake since four in the morning and was proud of it. "We have nine items still in yellow," she said, before anyone had even opened a notebook. "I want every one of them pink before we leave this table." "Good morning, grandma," I said.She waved her hand. "Sit down, Leon. Anastasia, sit. We have a lot to get through."Anastasia sat across from me and pulled the seating chart toward her without being asked. She had a pen out and her reading glasses on before the coordinator finished saying hello. I watched her scan the chart quickly, not really bothering to take her time. Within thirty seconds she had already marked two thin

084: Jennifer

Anastasia's POVI stayed at the bakery until late that night.It wasn't the orders that kept me there. The morning prep was done in an hour and I had no real reason to keep measuring flour and reorganising the cold shelf except that the kitchen was where I went when I had too much in my head and needed to move my hands. I turned the radio on low and worked and thought about the planning session and the wedding coordinator's colour-coded checklist and the way Leon had answered me when I asked him if there was anything I didn't know.He had said no. But his face was obviously saying yes. He had always been a terrible liar and I could see right through him, and the fact that he had looked at the table for half a second too long before answering told me more than the answer itself did. I didn't bother pressing him for the truth though.I also thought about Jennifer's calls.She had called very recently, three days ago, in the evening, while I was closing up. She had used the warm voice, t

085: Two days before Christmas

Leon's POVEleanor called me at eight in the morning to say she needed my opinion on the table arrangement for the rehearsal dinner.I had been coming to this house my entire life and I knew what Eleanor needing my opinion actually meant. It meant she had woken up early, found the house too quiet, and wanted someone there who belonged in it. I told her I would be there by ten. I said it without hesitation because there was no version of Eleanor asking me to come and me finding a reason not to.The estate looked different in the days just before Christmas. The decorations were finished and everything was exactly where it was supposed to be and there was nothing left to do, which meant my grandma had found other things to do. The caterer's first delivery of the week was coming through the kitchen when I arrived, and she was standing in the hallway directing two staff members on the placement of something that had clearly already been placed and then moved and then placed again. The tree

086: Christmas Eve

Anastasia's POV The Hart estate on Christmas Eve felt like a breath being held.Everything was finished. Every wreath was hung, every candle set, every arrangement confirmed and signed off and placed exactly where it needed to be. There was no reason left to adjust anything but Leon's grandma Eleanor was adjusting things anyway. When I arrived at half past nine she was in the hallway asking the housekeeper to move a small vase two inches to the left. When I came back through twenty minutes later the vase was two inches to the right. Eleanor was on the phone with the florist behind me, asking about the delivery window for the wedding ceremony flowers that had been confirmed three times already that week.Leon was already there when I arrived. He was in the kitchen drinking coffee and looking at Eleanor through the doorway with an expression I recognised from the previous afternoon, the one where he was watching her carefully and keeping his concern off his face because Eleanor would n

087: Christmas morning

Leon's POVMargaret met me at the door when I arrived at the Hart mansion at nine in the morning and told me that my grandma had been up since before 6 AM."She rearranged the drawing room twice," Margaret said. She had the expression of a woman who had seen many things in sixteen years of working for Eleanor Hart and had learned to measure which things were worth mentioning. She was mentioning this one. "She also called the caterer again.""On Christmas morning?""At seven forty-five." Margaret took my coat with the practiced efficiency of someone who had been doing it for a long time. "She told them she wanted to confirm the rehearsal dinner delivery time." She paused just long enough. "It was already confirmed."I thanked her and went to find Eleanor. I found her in the hallway adjusting the angle of a framed photograph on the wall by small increments, stepping back to assess it, then stepping forward to move it again. She was fully dressed, her hair done, jewellery on, moving with

088: Eleanor collapses

Anastasia's POVI saw it before it happened.Eleanor was standing at the drawing room sideboard, telling the housekeeper where to put a vase. She had been moving it back and forth all day, an inch this way, an inch that way, and I was sitting on the arm of the sofa watching her with the particular kind of tired patience you develop for the people you love."No, a little to the left," Eleanor said, tilting her head. "Yes. No, wait — back again."The housekeeper shifted the vase without a word, the way someone does when they have learned that objecting will only add more rounds to the process."There." Eleanor pointed. "Right — "She stopped.Not paused. Stopped. The way a song stops when someone pulls the power cord out of the wall.Her hand, the one that had been pointing, moved slowly to the edge of the sideboard instead. Her fingers found the wood and gripped it. I watched her head drop forward a little, just a fraction, like something inside her was losing its balance before the re

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