The coffee tastes like ash in my mouth, but I force it down anyway.

I've been at my desk for three hours already, trying to look busy while my brain replays last night's disaster on an endless loop. Cade's eyes meeting mine across the office. The way time seemed to fracture, leaving me suspended in that moment of recognition.

The way he looked at me like I was something he'd lost and just found again.

Stop it.

I attack the spreadsheet in front of me with renewed focus, even though the numbers blur together. I've checked these figures four times already. The acquisition paperwork is flawless—I made sure of it, because if there's one thing I can control in this nightmare, it's my job performance.

My phone buzzes. A text from my neighbor, Mrs. Chen, who watches Lily in the mornings before daycare.

Dropped her off. She asked about the man again.

My stomach drops.

What man?

The one she dreamed about. Says he had gray eyes like hers.

Jesus Christ. I'm raising a psychic.

I text back a thumbs up emoji because what else can I say? Sorry, that's her father who doesn't know she exists and is currently in the same building as me right now?

"Morning, Sloane."

I jolt so hard I knock my coffee over.

Brown liquid spreads across my desk in a slow-motion catastrophe, soaking into the acquisition documents I just spent three hours perfecting. I lunge for the papers, swearing viciously, trying to salvage them with napkins that disintegrate on contact.

"Shit, sorry—let me help."

Cade's already moving, grabbing the stack of files before the coffee reaches them, his movements efficient and unhurried. Like he has all the time in the world to invade my personal space and smell like cedar and smoke and every mistake I've ever made.

"I've got it." My voice comes out sharper than intended.

"Clearly." He doesn't move away. Instead, he sets the files down on the dry corner of my desk and hands me his own coffee—black, no sugar, I notice—before stripping off his jacket and using it to mop up the spill.

"Don't—that's expensive—"

"It's a jacket, Sloane."

The way he says my name makes my spine straighten. Like he's tasting it, testing how it feels in his mouth after five years of not saying it.

I should tell him to stop. Should maintain professional boundaries. Should do literally anything except stand here watching him clean up my mess with a thousand-dollar jacket while my pulse hammers in my throat.

He straightens, holding the soaked leather away from his body. Underneath, his t-shirt pulls tight across his shoulders, and I can see the edge of a tattoo creeping up his neck that wasn't there before.

New scars. New ink. Same storm-gray eyes that see too goddamn much.

"You always were jumpy in the mornings," he says quietly.

"I wasn't expecting company."

"No?" One dark eyebrow lifts. "Figured you'd know I was coming. It's my acquisition, after all."

Right. Because he owns the company now. Which means he owns my job, my security, the carefully constructed stability I've built for Lily.

The thought of my daughter sends a fresh spike of panic through my chest.

"The tour isn't until ten," I manage.

"Changed my mind." He drapes his ruined jacket over the back of my chair, claiming the space like he has every right to it. "Wanted to start earlier. Get a real feel for the operation."

Get a real feel for me, his eyes say.

I busy myself with the coffee-stained napkins, avoiding his gaze. "Well, I'm sure Martin can show you around—"

"I want you to do it."

Of course he does.

"I'm just a bookkeeper, Mr. Mercer. I'm not qualified to—"

"Cut the shit, Sloane." His voice drops, rough as gravel. "We both know you run this place. Martin told me himself you're the only reason they survived the last two years."

Damn Martin and his inability to keep his mouth shut.

"Fine." I straighten, meeting Cade's eyes with what I hope looks like professional composure and not barely contained panic. "When would you like to start?"

"Now."

---

The tour is torture.

Every conference room, every office, every narrow hallway becomes an exercise in spatial awareness. Cade moves through the building like he owns it—which, technically, he does now—but there's something else in the way he positions himself. Always too close. Always between me and the exit.

Crowding me.

In the archives room, he reaches past me to pull a file from the top shelf, and his chest brushes my shoulder. The scent of him—cedar and smoke and something darker, like leather left out in the rain—fills my lungs before I can stop myself from breathing.

"These are the records from 2019," I say, my voice admirably steady. "We're in the process of digitizing everything, but it's slow going."

"Mmm." He's not looking at the files. He's looking at me, close enough that I can see the silver threading through the stubble on his jaw. "You've done good work here."

"Just doing my job."

"That why you ran five hundred miles away? Just doing your job?"

My heart stops.

I turn to face him, which is a mistake because now we're inches apart in a room barely bigger than a closet, surrounded by banker's boxes and the ghosts of questions I can't answer.

"I didn't run."

"No?" He sets the file down without breaking eye contact. "Then what do you call disappearing in the middle of the night? No forwarding address, no explanation, nothing. Just gone."

"I moved. People move, Cade. It's not a crime."

"You broke my brother's heart."

The accusation hits like a physical blow. I force myself to hold his gaze, even as guilt twists in my stomach.

"Evan and I weren't right for each other. He deserved better than—"

"Than what?" Cade steps closer, and I'm backed against the filing cabinet with nowhere to go. "Than someone who'd ghost him after two years? Yeah, he definitely deserved better than that."

Heat crawls up my neck. He's right, and we both know it. What I did to Evan was cruel. Cowardly.

But staying would have been worse.

"I did what I had to do," I say quietly.

"Which was?"

Protect the secret growing in my belly. Protect the child you didn't know you'd made. Protect myself from the inevitable moment when you'd look at me with regret instead of desire.

"Leave," I say instead. "I had to leave."

Something flickers in his expression—confusion, maybe, or frustration. His hand comes up, and for one heart-stopping moment I think he's going to touch me. His fingers hover near my cheek, close enough that I can feel the heat of his skin.

Then his phone rings.

The spell breaks. Cade steps back, pulling the phone from his pocket with a muttered curse. He glances at the screen, and his jaw tightens.

"I have to take this." He's already moving toward the door. "Don't go anywhere."

Like I have a choice.

The moment he's gone, I sag against the filing cabinet, my legs suddenly unreliable. My hands are shaking. My pulse is racing. And between my thighs, there's an ache I haven't felt in five years.

Get it together, Hartley.

I give myself thirty seconds to fall apart, then push off the cabinet and head back to my desk. Work. I need to work. Need to focus on something other than the way Cade's voice goes rough when he says my name, or how his eyes track my movements like I'm something he wants to devour.

My desk phone is ringing when I get back.

"Sloane Hartley."

"Ms. Hartley? This is Sunshine Academy calling about Lily."

My blood turns to ice.

"Is she okay? What happened?"

"She's running a fever—101.3. No other symptoms yet, but our policy requires pickup within the hour if a child's temperature is over 100.4."

Of course it does. Because this day wasn't already a disaster.

"I'll be right there," I say, already grabbing my purse. "Twenty minutes, tops."

I hang up and nearly collide with Martin in my rush to the door.

"Whoa, where's the fire?"

"I have to go. Family emergency." It's not entirely a lie. "Can you cover the rest of Cade's—Mr. Mercer's tour?"

Martin's eyebrows climb toward his hairline. "Uh, he specifically asked for you to—"

"I don't care what he asked for. I have to leave. Now."

I'm already moving, but Martin catches my arm.

"Sloane. He's the new owner. You can't just ditch him on his first day."

"Watch me."

I shake him off and head for the exit, my heart pounding. Lily needs me. That's all that matters.

---

Lily's fever breaks that night, thank God, but she's clingy and fussy in a way that tells me she doesn't feel good even if the thermometer says otherwise. I cancel my plans—not that I had any—and spend the evening on the couch with her curled against my side, watching Moana for the eight hundredth time.

"Mama?"

"Yeah, baby?"

"My tummy hurts."

I press my palm to her forehead. Still warm, but not dangerously so. "I know, sweetheart. The medicine will help soon."

"Will you sing?"

My singing voice could strip paint, but Lily doesn't care. I hum the lullaby my grandmother used to sing to me, running my fingers through her wild dark curls. She has Cade's hair—thick and impossible to tame, with a mind of its own.

She has his eyes too. Storm-gray and far too perceptive for a four-year-old.

She has his stubborn chin and his intensity and his way of looking at the world like it's a puzzle to be solved.

She has everything of his except his name.

Guilt sits heavy in my chest as I hold her. Four years old, and she's already asking questions I can't answer. Why don't I have a daddy? Where is he? Does he know about me?

The lies get harder every day.

"Mama?" Lily's voice is drowsy now, the medicine finally kicking in. "The man in my dream..."

My hand stills in her hair. "What man, baby?"

"The one with eyes like mine. He was looking for something."

Ice creeps down my spine. "What was he looking for?"

But she's already asleep, her breathing evening out against my ribs.

I sit there in the blue glow of the TV, holding my daughter and trying not to think about the way Cade looked at me today. The suspicion in his eyes. The questions he's starting to ask.

How long before he puts the pieces together?

How long before he realizes the timeline doesn't add up—that I left town five years ago, right after that night, and now I have a four-year-old daughter with gray eyes?

How long before my carefully constructed world comes crashing down?

My phone buzzes on the coffee table. I reach for it with my free hand, expecting Mrs. Chen or maybe the daycare with follow-up instructions.

It's not.

It's a text from an unknown number.

We need to talk. No more running. —C

My heart stops.

Then starts again, too fast, too hard.

He has my personal number now. Which means he's been digging. Looking into my life, my history, probably pulling every piece of information he can find.

It's what I would do.

It's what I'm terrified he'll do.

I stare at the message until the screen goes dark, then set the phone down with shaking hands. Lily shifts in her sleep, and I hold her tighter, breathing in the scent of her strawberry shampoo and the faint smell of fever sweat.

"I'll keep you safe," I whisper against her hair. "I promise."

Even if keeping that promise means facing the one man who could destroy everything.

Even if it means lying to his face and pretending my heart doesn't race every time he's near.

Even if it means watching my past and present collide and hoping there's something left standing when the dust settles.

Tomorrow, I'll face Cade Mercer.

Tomorrow, I'll look him in the eye and tell him whatever lie will make him stop asking questions.

Tomorrow, I'll be strong.

But tonight—tonight I hold my daughter and count the ways this could all go wrong.

And pray that when it does, I'm strong enough to survive it.

My phone buzzes again.

Another text from Cade.

I know you're hiding something, Sloane. And I'm going to find out what.