Grace POV
Grace tells herself this is just work.
She sits at her desk at eight o'clock and watches Henry walk through her office door carrying a stack of files. He looks exhausted. He looks like a man who hasn't slept in days. He looks like someone who's been drowning and just grabbed onto a piece of wood.
He looks like he's looking at her like she's the piece of wood saving his life.
Stop, Grace thinks. This is business. Nothing more.
They spread documents across the conference table. Files about Ashford Capital. Contract agreements. Email threads. Years of business decisions laid out for her to analyze. The city lights blur outside the windows and Grace forces herself to focus on the papers instead of the man sitting across from her.
She starts asking questions. Hard questions. About his business practices. About decisions he made. About his ethics.
How did you build an empire without thinking about the people you hurt along the way. How did you make billions of pounds by crushing competitors. How did you trust Marcus Reid enough to give him access to everything.
Henry answers everything.
He doesn't deflect. He doesn't make excuses. He just tells her the truth. About the deals he made. About the corners he cut. About the people he destroyed to get ahead.
And as Grace listens she realizes something. Underneath every answer is a story about loneliness. About a man so afraid of needing people that he buried himself in work instead. About someone who destroyed relationships because love felt like weakness.
"I was terrified," Henry says quietly. It's two in the morning and they've been working for six hours. "Of depending on anyone. Of needing someone more than they needed me. So I built walls and I filled them with work and I told myself that money was enough."
Grace knows exactly what that feels like.
She knows what it's like to bury yourself in something because the alternative is feeling the pain. She knows what it's like to be so afraid of trusting anyone that you build your entire life around not needing them. She knows what it's like to use ambition like a weapon against the loneliness.
She recognizes herself in Henry's confession and that's the problem.
That's the trap.
Grace stands up suddenly. Her chair scrapes back against the floor loudly.
"We're done," she says.
Henry looks up at her with surprise written across his face.
"It's late. We've been working for six hours. We both need sleep." Grace starts gathering papers with hands that aren't quite steady. "We'll continue tomorrow."
"Grace—"
"We need to be sharp for this. We can't be sharp if we're exhausted." She's lying and they both know it. She's not leaving because she's tired. She's leaving because sitting in this office at two in the morning listening to Henry confess his loneliness is dangerous. It's making her remember why she loved him. It's making her understand that they're more similar than she wanted to believe.
Henry watches her move around the office. He stands up slowly.
"Thank you," he says.
Grace pauses. She doesn't turn around.
"For what. For taking your case. For the money. For the retainer."
"No," Henry says quietly. "For giving me time. Any time at all. I know you didn't have to do this. I know you have every reason to let me burn. But you didn't. You came tonight. You're helping me. And I just wanted you to know that I'm aware of what that costs you."
Grace's hands go very still.
She wants to turn around. She wants to tell him that she's not doing this for him. She's doing this for the money and the case and the prestige. She's doing this because Sophia was right and she needs to move forward instead of being stuck in revenge.
She doesn't say any of that.
Instead she says, "See you tomorrow," and walks out of her own office without looking back.
She can feel Henry watching her leave. She can feel the weight of his gratitude and his hope and his loneliness pressing against her like something physical.
Grace walks down the hallway and into the empty stairwell and doesn't stop moving until she's outside in the cold London air.
She stands on the street at two thirty in the morning and realizes what she's just agreed to.
Months. She's agreed to work with him for months. Months of late nights in her office. Months of proximity and proximity and more proximity. Months of watching him slowly become human again. Months of him looking at her like she matters.
Months of falling back in love with him.
Grace walks home in the darkness and doesn't sleep.
By the time morning comes and Sophia walks into the office, Grace is sitting at her desk staring at nothing. She hasn't moved. She hasn't blinked. She's just been sitting there in the same clothes she wore last night thinking about Henry's voice saying thank you.
Sophia takes one look at her and knows.
"You spent the night with him," Sophia says. It's not a question.
"We worked on his case."
"Grace." Sophia sits on the edge of the desk. "You're going to fall in love with him again."
Grace doesn't answer. She doesn't deny it. She just keeps staring at nothing because denying it would be lying and she's too tired to lie anymore.
The silence between them says everything that needs to be said.
"Grace—"
"I know," Grace whispers. "I already know."