JAMES POV
The scotch tastes like ash and regret.
James sits on the fifty-second floor with his feet propped on a desk worth more than most people's houses. The city spreads below him like a game he won and forgot how to play. Lights everywhere. Movement everywhere. Life everywhere. And he's stuck up here in this glass box feeling like a ghost.
His therapist quit today.
Number seven this month. Her name was Margaret or Melissa or something with an M. It doesn't matter. They all quit eventually. They all realize within two weeks that James Kent is too far gone to bother with. They send their polite emails. They use words like "resistant" and "unwilling to engage" and "unable to establish therapeutic alliance." Fancy ways of saying he's a waste of their time.
He finally opens the email at ten PM. Doesn't bother reading past the first paragraph. Already knows how it ends. They all end the same way. With him alone in an office and a bottle getting emptier and the city not giving a shit whether he lives or dies.
His phone rings and it's Van.
James considers not answering. Considers just letting it ring and ring until Van gets tired. But Van doesn't get tired. That's Van's whole problem. Van keeps showing up even when James fires him. Van keeps trying even when it's clear that James is a lost cause.
"Yeah," James says instead of hello.
"Hey man. I've been thinking about what we talked about on Friday."
"About how I need another therapist I'll fire in two weeks?"
"About how Margaret was actually pretty good and you didn't give her a chance."
James laughs and it sounds wrong in his own ears. "She quit, Van. I didn't fire her. There's a difference."
"Barely," Van says and there's something tired in his voice. James recognizes that tired. He causes that tired in everyone he's around. "Look, I found someone new. Someone different. You should at least take a meeting."
"No."
"James, come on—"
"No more therapists. No more talking about my feelings. No more sitting in a room telling a stranger about the day I came home and found Elena in my best friend's bed. I'm done with that."
There's silence on the other end. James can hear the gears turning in Van's brain. Van's trying to figure out how to manipulate him into being better. After ten years of friendship, Van still thinks he can fix this. Still thinks persistence and optimism and genuine concern will somehow pull James out of this hole he's been digging for three years.
It won't.
"This person doesn't try to fix you," Van says finally.
"What does that even mean. That's the literal job description."
"Not this time. This person just creates space for you to exist. No judgment. No fixing. Just... presence."
James sets the scotch down and rubs his eyes. The glass is slippery with condensation or sweat. He's not sure which. "Who is this person, Van. Some kind of life coach. One of those Instagram wellness influencers."
"It's a private housekeeper. Someone who understands that sometimes people need help with the basics before they can deal with the emotional stuff."
James almost hangs up right there. Van has officially lost it. Van is now hiring housekeepers to fix his mental health. This is what happens when you let one person care about you for too long. They start making decisions for you like you're a child.
"Absolutely not."
"I'm serious, James. She's perfect for what you need right now."
"What I need is to be left alone."
"That's exactly what you don't need," Van says and there's something sharp in his voice now. Something that sounds like he's finally giving up on being patient. "What you need is someone in your space who understands that healing doesn't look like therapy. It looks like someone showing up and not expecting anything from you except that you keep existing."
James picks the scotch back up. The liquor burns going down. Good. Pain feels real. Pain feels like something. "Set it up then. I'll prove you wrong in two weeks."
"Give it a month."
"Two weeks."
Van sighs and James can hear him typing. "Fine. Two weeks. But James? Don't push her away before you actually get to know her. She's different from the others."
They hang up and James sits there listening to the sound of the city outside his window. Car horns. Sirens. The ambient noise of a million people living lives that don't feel hollow and empty.
He refills his glass and pulls up his email.
Just scrolling. Just killing time. Just waiting for the notifications to pile up so he can ignore them all.
That's when he sees it.
Hartwell Legal Associates.
His stomach drops.
James stares at the sender address like it's going to change. Like if he looks long enough it'll be someone else. Someone less catastrophic. But the name is still there. Elena Hartwell. His Elena. Or she used to be his. Before she became someone else's.
Before she became his enemy.
He hovers over the email for two full minutes before he opens it. His hands are shaking slightly. He pretends he doesn't notice.
The email is short. Professional. Clean.
It says Elena is coming to the city for a merger negotiation. Tomorrow at two PM. At his office. They need to discuss acquisition opportunities for Kent Industries.
James reads it three times.
They want his company.
Of course they do.
He pulls up the research he has on Elena that he pretends he doesn't maintain. Three years of data. Her marriage to Marcus. Her rise at the law firm. The expansion of her business interests. The pieces he's watched her acquire strategically and methodically and with perfect patience.
Shell corporations he didn't recognize. Acquisitions he missed. Board members who started acting strange.
Hartwell-Voss Industries.
Marcus and Elena. Building an empire on the back of his failure.
James stands up and walks to the window and presses his palms against the glass. The city is so far below. So small. So indifferent to whether he exists or whether he jumps.
He types an email with shaking fingers.
"I'll be there. Tomorrow at two."
He hits send and the words disappear into the void.
Then he finishes the bottle and watches the city glow below him like it's already celebrating his destruction.
Elena Hartwell is coming back.
The woman who shattered him is coming back to finish the job.
And James doesn't know that by tomorrow night he's going to meet someone who will make him want to survive what Elena is about to do. He doesn't know that his entire life is about to change in ways he can't predict or control or prevent.
He just sits there in the dark with an empty bottle and a city full of lights and the knowledge that tomorrow everything goes wrong.