Ethan stood dead in her path,
"Lena."
His voice was warm and wrong. Familiar the way a childhood house is familiar when the furniture's been moved. The executive lobby sharpened around him. Brass lights, a smear of city through glass, the quiet thrum of money.
Julian was at her shoulder. Not touching. Close enough that the air knew him.
Lena's breath hitched once. The collar lay hidden under the first button of her blouse. If she swallowed, leather brushed air.
"Hey," Ethan said, stepping in with an anxious half-smile that asked for things he didn't have language for. "I… I texted. I'm in town. Thought…"
Julian's gray eyes moved to Ethan, then back to Lena, reading her the way he always did. Pulse at her throat, the set of her mouth, the give in her knees. He didn't insert himself. He turned slightly, aligning their bodies like a quiet shield.
"Ethan," she managed. Her voice came out courtroom-smooth by habit, not by grace. "This is…."
"Julian Hart," Julian said, offering a hand Ethan had to accept. "We're on the same matter this week."
"We are?" Ethan glanced to her, searching. "You didn't say you were… working with someone new."
"I am," she said. The words tasted like jumping and landing at the same time.
Julian's phone buzzed once. Hers buzzed a beat later. She glanced down.
Julian: Color?
The question dropped in her stomach like a stone and steadied everything around it. Soft but absolute. She didn't look up.
Lena: Green.
Ethan's eyes were on her face. "Can we talk? Five minutes. Upstairs. Please."
Julian didn't move. He was presence and line, nothing else. "You have a call at nineteen past, Ms. Vale," he said mildly, as if she were the only audience that mattered. "The board will be on."
Ethan blinked. "She's not your assistant."
Julian's mouth almost smiled. "No."
The room tightened a fraction. Lena felt it in her ribs, a band drawing snug.
"Ethan," she said, angling her body so he couldn't accidentally catch the collar if she breathed wrong. "This isn't the time."
His jaw flexed. "Then make time. It's not like you to ignore me."
Her phone lit again.
Julian: Presence. Two fingers on the stem.
Julian: Shoulders down. Breathe.
She didn't have a glass. She set two fingers lightly to the strap of her bag instead, the motion so small it felt private. Her shoulders softened a degree. She breathed. The world obeyed.
Ethan tracked the move, baffled. "What is, Lena, what's going on with you?"
"I'm working," she said, even. "And I'm fine."
"You don't look fine."
Julian's voice lowered half a shade. "Mr. Vale, if you'd like Lena to look fine, you'll also want her to make her call."
Ethan flushed. Pride, confusion, the old ache she remembered too well. "We're married."
The word cracked open and echoed. The lobby heard it and pretended not to.
Julian didn't flinch. "And I'm a client this week."
"Client," Ethan repeated, like it was a riddle with only one answer and he didn't like it.
Lena felt the collar at her throat, phantom, cool under silk. She had the absurd thought that if she lifted her chin another half inch, it would show; if she lowered it, she'd be hiding. She kept it exactly where Julian liked,
Upright, unapologetic.
"Let's sit," Ethan said, reaching as if to guide her elbow the way he always had.
Two things happened at once:
Julian stepped a half-inch closer. Still not touching her, but moving the air so Ethan's hand found nothing but space.
Her phone buzzed.
Julian: White dot if you need me to slow it. Black if you need me closer.
Her thumb hovered. She did neither.
"Ethan," she said, gentler. "Not here."
"So where?" he pushed. "Your room? Mine? Downstairs at the…"
"Mr. Vale," Julian said, the name courteous and final at once. "We're due with counsel now. If you'd like time, coordinate it through Lena." A beat. "Professionally."
Ethan laughed once, disbelieving. "Professionally."
Steel slid under silk in Julian's tone. "Yes."
Ethan's gaze snagged on her throat. He wouldn't have seen leather, he couldn't, but his eyes narrowed anyway at the shadow where skin met silk. "Are you… wearing something?"
Heat hit her cheeks. The floor tilted.
Julian's hand didn't touch her, but his voice did. "Color?"
"Green," she breathed, not looking away from Ethan.
"Good girl," Julian said so quietly only she heard it.
The words steadied her spine like a hand. She didn't wince at the pleasure that slipped through her at the worst possible moment; she rode it like a wave that set her down higher on the shore.
Ethan watched her face like it was a door closing. "Is there someone else?"
"Yes," Julian said, mild as weather.
Lena's head snapped a fraction toward him. He didn't look at her.
She swallowed. "There's… there's work," she said, and hated the cowardice of it even as it bought her seconds. "We have to…"
"Then after," Ethan said, raw. "Tonight."
Her phone vibrated, a single pulse.
Julian: Answer him. Tell him 'tomorrow, ten a.m., public place.' Then mean it.
She felt the command slide into her body the way a breath does. Automatic, chosen. She nodded once, to Ethan. "Tomorrow. Ten. The atrium coffee bar."
Ethan exhaled like he'd been given a stay. "Okay. Okay." His mouth twisted. "You'll be there."
"I will," he looked at Julian, "And you won't."
Julian's gray eyes went perfectly calm. "I won't need to be."
Ethan shook his head and stepped back. "Tomorrow." He turned too quickly, like the room might steal more from him if he lingered. He was gone before she could name the expression on his face.
Silence returned in a wave and then thinned into threadbare normal.
Lena stood very still.
Julian didn't touch her. He angled toward her the way gravity angles toward mass. "Color?"
She tried for a joke and found honesty instead. "Green… and shaking."
"Shake in my direction," he said, voice low. "Not backward."
Her laugh broke on a breath. "That's not how shaking works."
"It is now." He tipped his head toward the elevators. "You have three minutes."
"For the call?"
"For us." His eyes found the notch at her throat. "Service corridor. North door."
Her heart sprinted. "Now?"
"You just told your husband tomorrow," he murmured, stepping close enough that heat slipped under her blouse without a touch. "You'll tell your body today."
She should have said no. She nodded instead.
They moved together without seeming to. In the shadow of the service door, the world dimmed to the color of his suit and the sound of her pulse. He didn't lock it. He braced one hand on the wall beside her head and waited until her breath matched his.
"Color?" he asked again. Quiet, coded, the check that could stop anything.
"Green," she said, and felt the truth of it bloom hot and terrifying across her skin.
"Palms on the wall," he said. "Eyes on me."
Her phone buzzed in her hand, calendar chime for the board call. She slid it into her pocket without looking away.
Julian smiled, barely, wickedly. "We'll be quick."
"What does that mean?"
"It means," he said, thumb finding the line of her collar like a signature, "I'm about to remind you why tomorrow doesn't scare me."
He leaned in…and the service door handle rattled. A voice on the other side. Hotel staff. Laughter, a cart bumping the jamb.
Julian's eyes didn't flicker. He didn't move. He only pressed once, gently, under the leather at her throat, turning fear into focus again.
"After the call," he whispered, heat ghosting her mouth. "We finish this."
The handle stilled. The hall breathed. The world waited.
Lena swallowed, dizzy with dread and wanting. "Yes, Sir."
He stepped back exactly one pace, the leash between them invisible and iron.
"Go win," he said.
She did. And she knew, when she came back, she wouldn't be the only thing colliding.
End of Chapter Nine
Next: Chapter 10 - Aftershock