Ethan's POV
My father's voice is still echoing in my head as we walk through Manhattan's streets.
"Someone paid Marcus to destroy her, Ethan. Someone powerful. Someone who's still watching."
Zara hasn't said a word since we left the café. She's walking beside me, her hand still in mine, but she's somewhere else. Somewhere dark.
I should let go of her hand. We're in public. People might see. My reputation as the cold, untouchable divorce lawyer doesn't exactly fit with holding hands like teenagers.
But I don't let go.
Because twenty minutes ago, I watched her have a panic attack in a therapy office hallway. I watched her break apart, and something inside me broke with her.
I'm supposed to be immune to this. To feelings. To caring.
Except I'm not. Not with her.
"Where are we going?" she asks quietly.
"Somewhere we can talk. Before we meet my father." I pull her toward a small coffee shop tucked between two buildings. The kind of place nobody famous goes to. The kind of place where we can disappear.
Inside, it smells like coffee and old books. There are maybe five other people here, all lost in their laptops or novels. Nobody looks up when we enter.
Perfect.
I guide Zara to a corner booth, the farthest from the door. She sits down like her legs might give out.
"I'll get coffee," I say.
"I already had—"
"You need something in your system besides panic." It comes out harsher than I meant. "Please."
She nods.
At the counter, I order two coffees and force myself to breathe. To think. To figure out what the hell I'm doing.
My father called. After eighteen years of silence, Robert Cross called me. And the first words out of his mouth weren't an apology or an explanation for abandoning his family.
They were about Zara.
How does he even know about her? How does he know about Marcus? And if what he said is true—if Marcus was hired to destroy her—then this isn't just revenge. This is something bigger. Something dangerous.
I grab the coffees and return to the booth. Zara is staring at her hands like they hold answers.
"Here." I slide the cup toward her.
She wraps her fingers around it but doesn't drink. Just holds it. Like she needs something to hold onto.
For a long moment, we sit in silence. The kind of silence that's heavy with words nobody knows how to say.
Finally, I break it.
"What happened to you?" I ask gently. "With Marcus. The real story. Not the version you tell clients or friends. The version that made you stop believing in the thing you sell every day."
Her eyes snap up to mine. "Why do you want to know?"
"Because someone targeted you. And if I'm going to help you figure out who, I need to understand why."
"Maybe there is no why. Maybe I'm just unlucky."
"You're not unlucky, Zara. You're..." I stop, searching for the right word. "You're hunted."
She flinches.
"I don't mean that to scare you," I say quickly. "I mean someone has been watching you. Planning. And I need to know everything so I can protect you."
"Why?" Her voice cracks. "Why do you even care? You hate everything I believe in. You think love is a lie and marriage is a trap. Why does it matter what happened to me?"
Because you make me want to believe again.
Because when you defended love in that elevator, I saw courage I've never had.
Because you're the first person in eighteen years who's made me feel something besides anger.
But I can't say that. Not yet. Not when we're about to walk into a meeting with my father that could destroy everything.
"Because you didn't deserve what happened to you," I say instead. "And because I'm tired of watching people get away with destroying others."
She studies my face like she's looking for a lie. When she doesn't find one, something in her softens.
"Okay," she whispers. "Okay."
She takes a sip of coffee. Sets it down. Stares at it for so long I think she won't speak.
Then she does.
"Marcus and I were together for four years," she begins, her voice flat. Emotionless. Like she's reading a script. "We met in college. He was charming. Confident. Everything I thought I wanted. By our second year together, we'd started a wedding planning business. It was my idea, but he had the connections. The rich friends. The trust fund to invest."
I listen without interrupting. My usual instinct is to ask questions, to push, to cross-examine. But something tells me she needs to tell this her way.
"We were good together. At least, I thought we were." Her fingers trace the rim of her coffee cup. "He made me feel special. Important. Like I mattered. And the business was growing fast. We were planning weddings for celebrities, politicians, people with money and influence."
"That's when things changed," I say quietly.
She nods. "I started getting more recognition than him. Magazine features. Award nominations. Clients would request me specifically. And Marcus..." She swallows hard. "He started pulling away. Working late. Being distant. I thought he was stressed about the business. I thought if I just worked harder, loved him better, it would get better."
The pain in her voice cuts through me.
"Then Vanessa joined us," she continues. "My best friend from college. She needed a job, and I thought it would be perfect—the three of us working together. Building something amazing." A bitter laugh escapes. "I was so stupid."
"You weren't stupid. You were trusting."
"Same thing." She finally looks at me. "They started the affair six months after Vanessa joined. I found out later they'd been planning to push me out of the company from the beginning. Vanessa only took the job to get close to Marcus and steal client information."
My hands curl into fists under the table. "When did you find out?"
"My wedding day." Her voice breaks on the words. "I was getting ready. Hair done, makeup perfect, my dress on. I went to find Marcus to give him his gift before the ceremony. Found him in the bridal suite. With Vanessa. She was wearing my dress. The one I'd just taken off to fix my hair."
Jesus Christ.
"They were having sex," she whispers. "In my dress. On my wedding day. While two hundred guests waited downstairs."
I want to find Marcus Reid and destroy him. Slowly. Painfully.
"What did you do?" I ask, though I already know. She ran. Of course she ran.
"I left. Called off the wedding. Locked myself in my apartment for three days." She wipes her eyes roughly. "When I finally went back to work, they'd already made their move. Told all our clients I had a breakdown. That I was unstable. Unreliable. They took everything—client lists, vendor relationships, half the money in our business account. By the time I hired a lawyer, it was too late. The partnership agreement I'd signed gave them legal right to half of everything."
"But you rebuilt," I say. "You started over."
"I had no choice. It was rebuild or give up completely." She meets my eyes. "But Ethan, I'm not the person you think I am. I'm not strong or brave. I'm terrified every single day. Terrified I'll fail. Terrified someone else will betray me. Terrified that Marcus was right about me being nothing without him."
"He was wrong," I say fiercely. "About all of it."
"Was he?" She laughs hollowly. "Look at last night. My biggest wedding in three years just imploded. Marcus is spreading rumors about me again. And now you're telling me someone paid him to destroy me? Maybe I am cursed. Maybe I'm—"
"Stop." I reach across the table and grab her hand. "Listen to me. You survived something that would have destroyed most people. You rebuilt your entire life from nothing. You help people celebrate love even though yours was shattered. That's not weakness. That's—" I struggle for the word. "That's heroic."
Tears spill down her cheeks. "Don't say that."
"Why not? It's true."
"Because if you keep saying things like that, I'm going to start believing you." Her voice drops to a whisper. "And I can't afford to believe in anything right now."
The vulnerability in her words guts me.
Before I can respond, my phone buzzes. A text from an unknown number:
"Tick tock, son. Midnight at the Brighton Hotel penthouse. Come alone, or she finds out the truth from someone else. And trust me—you want to be there when she learns what Marcus really did to her. What YOU helped him do."
My blood turns to ice.
What I helped him do?
I stare at the message. Read it again. And again.
"Ethan?" Zara's voice sounds far away. "What's wrong? You look—"
"We need to go." I stand up too fast. The table shakes. Coffee spills.
"Go where? What did the text say?"
I can't tell her. Not until I know what my father means. What I supposedly helped Marcus do.
Because I've never met Marcus Reid in my life.
Haven't I?
A memory flashes—three years ago, a client consultation, a man asking about partnership dissolution agreements, how to legally remove someone from a business they started...
No.
No, that can't be right.
"Ethan, you're scaring me."
I look at Zara—this woman who trusted me, who just poured out her trauma, who's looking at me like I'm her lifeline.
And I realize with sick certainty that my father is about to tell her something that will make her hate me.
Something I don't even remember doing.
"The meeting with my father," I say slowly. "It's tonight. Midnight. And Zara..." I swallow hard. "He says I helped Marcus destroy you."
Her face goes white. "What?"
"I don't know what he means. I don't remember—" But even as I say it, that memory grows clearer. The client three years ago who wanted advice on pushing out a business partner. Who said his girlfriend was getting too much credit for their joint company.
A client I helped.
A client whose name I can't remember.
"Did you?" Zara's voice is hollow. Broken. "Did you help him?"
"I don't know," I admit, and the confession feels like swallowing glass. "But I'm going to find out."