The Ticket Was Never for His Mistress Chapter 13

The Ticket Was Never for His Mistress Chapter 13

Spring came to London in soft pink cherry blossoms along the Thames.

I was eight months pregnant and had never been busier.

Lumen 2.0 launched in April. We had fourteen million users in the first week. The press called it the most elegant Al architecture of the decade.”

TIME Magazine put me on the cover.

The headline: “The Wife Who Wrote the Code.”

I hung it in the nursery. Not for me. For her.

So she’d know.

The launch party was on the rooftop of the Callahan building. Champagne for the guests. Sparkling

elderflower for me.

I wore a flowing emerald dress that made me look like a very glamorous watermelon. Rhys told me I was the most beautiful woman in London. I told him he needed his eyes checked.

“I’m serious,” he said.

“You’re biased.”

“Deeply.”

People came up to congratulate me all night. Investors. Engineers. A princess, briefly, which was surreal.

Nobody called me “Grant’s wife.”

Nobody asked where my husband was.

They asked about my work. My vision. My next project.

When the crowd thinned, I slipped away to the edge of the terrace. The city glittered below. Tower Bridge lit up gold. The river black and shining.

My feet ached. My back ached. My heart felt full to the edges.

Footsteps behind me.

Rhys. With a chair.

“Sit,” he said.

I’m fine.”

“You’ve been standing for four hours. Sit, or I’ll carry you again and the whole board will see.”

I sat.

He stood beside me, hands in his pockets, looking at the river.

“I have news,” he said. “Brooke took a plea deal. Three years. And she’s banned from ever working in financial management again.”

I nodded. I felt nothing. She was a chapter in a book I’d already closed.

“And Grant?” I asked.

“Six months sober. Walter says he’s teaching coding to kids at a community center in Oakland. Free.”

I smiled a little. “Good.”

“You mean that.”

“I do. I don’t hate him, Rhys. I just don’t live there anymore.”

He was quiet for a long time.

The wind moved through my hair. Somewhere below, a boat horn sounded.

“Hazel,” he said. “I need to tell you something. And you can tell me to shut up.”

My heart started pounding.

“I’ve waited because it wasn’t the right time. You were healing. You didn’t need another man asking you for something.”

He turned to face me.

“I’m not asking now either. I just want you to know.”

He knelt beside my chair. Not on one knee. Just down at my level, so I didn’t have to look up at him.

“I don’t want to be your savior. You don’t need one. I’ve never met anyone who needed one less.”

His gray eyes were steady.

“I just want to be the one who shows up. Every appointment. Every 3 a.m. feeding. Every bad day and every launch party. I want to be the one who never looks at his watch.”

throat closed.

“Rhys-”

“You don’t have to answer.” He smiled. “I’ll still be here tomorrow. And the day after.”

I looked at him.

This man who had waited outside every exam room.

Who had learned exactly how I took my tea.

Who had knelt in my living room with his hand on my belly and whispered hello to a child that wasn’t his.

“Ask me again,” I said softly. “After she’s born.”

He nodded. Like that was the best answer he’d ever gotten.

“I will.”

“Rhys?”

“Yes?”

“Dance with me.”

He blinked.

“One song,” I said. “Right here.”

He didn’t look at his watch.

He didn’t hesitate at all.

He just stood, took my hands, and pulled me gently to my feet. There was no music on the terrace, only the faint jazz drifting from inside.

He held me carefully, one hand on my back, my belly between us, and swayed.

Badly.

“You’re terrible at this,” I laughed.

“I’m Scottish. We only dance at weddings and funerals.”

Which one is this?”

He looked down at me.

“Neither,” he said. “It’s a beginning.”

The baby kicked. Hard. Right into his stomach.

He laughed out loud. “She approves.”

“She’s reserving judgment.”

“Like her mother.”

We danced until the song ended. And then another. And another.

For the first time in my life, someone chose me without being asked twice.