Grace POV
By day three, Grace realizes she's in trouble.
She and Henry have fallen into a rhythm. Every night at eight o'clock he arrives at her office with files and coffee. They work until three or four in the morning. The hours blur together until Grace can't tell where work ends and something else begins.
He's different now.
That's the problem. That's the thing that's slowly dismantling every wall she's built. Henry isn't playing the powerful billionaire anymore. He's softer. When he doesn't know something, he admits it instead of pretending. When she asks him questions, he answers them honestly without hiding behind legal language.
He's becoming someone she could actually trust.
Grace spreads documents across her desk on night four and watches him work. He's concentrating on a contract, his blue eyes focused, his jaw tight. He looks tired but he keeps working. He keeps pushing. He keeps fighting for the company that's falling apart.
She hates that she finds it attractive.
Henry looks up and catches her watching him. He smiles. Not a powerful CEO smile. A real smile. The kind of smile that reaches his eyes.
Grace's heart does something dangerous.
"What," he says.
"Nothing. Keep working."
But he keeps looking at her like she's the only person who matters. Like watching her watch him is the best part of his entire night. Like he'd rather be looking at her than reading a contract worth millions.
Grace forces herself to focus on the documents. She asks him questions about Marcus's business tactics. She makes him explain decisions. She keeps the conversation professional because if she stops keeping it professional she might remember what it felt like when he loved her.
And she can't afford to remember that.
Sophia corners her on day five.
"You're getting too invested," Sophia says bluntly. They're in the bathroom at the office, Grace looking in the mirror, Sophia standing in the doorway blocking the exit. "You're spending sixteen hours a day with him. That's rewiring your brain to forgive him."
"I'm doing my job," Grace says.
"You're falling back in love with him."
"I'm not."
"Grace." Sophia steps closer. "I've known you for seven years. I watched you survive him. I watched you build a career on refusing to need anyone. And in one week of working together you're already looking at him like he hung the moon."
Grace turns away from the mirror. "It's proximity. It's just proximity and late nights. It doesn't mean anything."
"Then why are you changing your clothes before he arrives."
Grace goes very still.
"You think I don't notice. But I notice. You're putting on makeup. You're choosing different suits. Yesterday you spent twenty minutes looking at yourself in the bathroom mirror." Sophia's voice is gentle but firm. "That's not professional distance. That's a woman remembering how to feel."
"Stop," Grace says.
"I'm just warning you. Don't let him back in. He'll destroy you again."
Grace pushes past her and goes back to work.
But Sophia's words sit in her chest like something poisonous. Because Sophia's right. Grace is changing how she dresses. She is putting on makeup. She is looking forward to eight o'clock when Henry arrives with his files and his tired smile and his absolute attention focused completely on her.
On day six, Henry walks into her office and sets down two cups of coffee.
Grace looks at them. She doesn't touch them.
"I brought you coffee," he says like it's no big deal. "From that place on the corner of Bishopsgate. The one you loved. Double espresso with just a touch of honey. The way you like it."
Grace's hands go very still.
He remembered.
Seven years ago, before the prenup, before the affairs, before everything fell apart, Henry used to bring her coffee exactly like this. Double espresso with just a touch of honey. He remembered how she took her coffee and he brought it to her without her asking.
She touches the cup and realizes Henry is watching her face.
"You remembered," she says quietly.
"I remembered everything, Grace." His voice is soft. "Everything about you. How you take your coffee. The way you laugh. The way you look when you're concentrating. The way you used to fall asleep on my chest at three in the morning."
Grace picks up the coffee cup.
Her hands are shaking.
"That was a different time. A different person."
"I know," Henry says. "I'm not asking you to remember that person. I'm just telling you that I did. That I do. That I think about it every day."
Grace brings the cup to her lips and takes a sip.
The taste hits her like a punch. Exactly how she likes it. Exactly like he used to make it. Exactly like the before times when she believed in forever.
The cup slips from her fingers.
Coffee spills across her desk. It soaks into documents. It spreads like something alive. Grace watches it happen and something inside her breaks.
She doesn't move to clean it up.
She just stands there and watches the coffee destroy the papers she's been working on and realizes that everything she's built is crumbling. Her walls are coming down. Her professional distance is dissolving. Henry is right there and he smells like cologne and coffee and seven years of missing her.
Henry moves without thinking.
He pulls her away from the mess. His hands are on her shoulders, turning her toward him. He's looking at her with concern and something else. Something that looks like hope.
"Grace, are you okay. Did the coffee burn you."
She can't answer because answering would mean admitting that she's not okay. That she hasn't been okay in seven years. That standing this close to him is making her forget why she swore she'd never let him touch her again.
"I'm fine," she whispers. But she's not fine.
Henry's hands are still on her shoulders. They're so close she can feel the warmth coming off his body. She can see the blue of his eyes up close. She can see the way he's looking at her like he's been waiting seven years for this moment.
The room gets smaller.
Grace can't breathe. She can't think. She can only feel the weight of his hands on her shoulders and remember exactly what it felt like to be intimate with him. To have his body against hers. To trust him with everything.
Henry leans down and for one terrible perfect moment Grace thinks he's going to kiss her.
And the worst part is that she thinks she might let him.