Eleanor's POV
Eleanor closed the boardroom door and walked straight to her office without looking at anyone.
She didn't acknowledge the congratulations. Didn't accept the praise. Didn't stop for the executives trying to catch her attention in the hallways. She just moved forward like a woman on a mission, which she was. A mission that had just succeeded spectacularly and destroyed her in the process.
She locked her office door and fell apart.
Her hands were shaking so badly she had to grip the edge of her desk. Her breathing came in short, sharp gasps. Everything she'd been holding back for the last four hours came crashing down at once. Seeing him. Hearing his voice when he asked to speak with her privately. Watching his face when he realized it was her sitting in that chair, cutting his company to pieces.
She'd won. She'd absolutely demolished him. And it felt like losing.
Eleanor made it to her bathroom and locked that door too. She ran cold water and splashed it on her face over and over until her skin went numb. She looked at the woman in the mirror. That woman had been perfect. Ice cold. Completely professional. Completely merciless.
This woman was falling apart.
She set a timer on her phone. Five minutes. That's all she could afford. Five minutes to feel this and then she had to rebuild. She had to pull the armor back on because she still had a three o'clock meeting with him and she couldn't let him see her like this.
Eleanor sat on the bathroom floor with her back against the door and let everything come. The guilt. The satisfaction. The crushing weight of knowing exactly what she'd done to him. The memory of his face going pale. The way his hands had gripped the table edge like he was drowning.
She thought about the woman's voice on the phone. About the emails. About someone knowing exactly what had happened between her and Harrison. About someone warning her that he was going to tell her the truth at three o'clock.
Three minutes left on the timer.
She closed her eyes and breathed. In and out. In and out. The same way she'd taught herself to breathe these past two years whenever the panic came. Whenever the memories tried to pull her under.
One minute.
Eleanor stood and washed her face again. Cold water. Sharp movements. She dried her skin carefully. She checked her makeup in the mirror. Perfect. Professional. The woman looking back at her was composed and strong and completely in control.
By the time the timer went off, Eleanor Wells the CEO was back in place. The armor was secure. The walls were reinforced. The woman who'd just destroyed her ex-husband in front of thirty executives was gone, replaced by someone who could sit across from him in her office and discuss business like her heart wasn't breaking.
She stepped out of the bathroom and straightened her suit. The clock read two fifteen. Forty-five minutes until he walked into her office. Forty-five minutes of her sitting at her desk pretending to work while her insides screamed.
Eleanor tried to focus on her emails but the words blurred together. She couldn't concentrate. Couldn't think about anything except what was coming. What he was going to say. What she was going to do when he looked at her with those broken eyes and tried to explain why he'd destroyed them both.
She didn't hear Marcus arrive. He just appeared in her office doorway at six o'clock with a paper bag of takeout food and a look of deep concern.
"Tell me you ate something today," he said, setting the bag on her desk.
Eleanor looked at her brother. She saw the worry in his eyes. The love. The fierce loyalty that had never wavered even when she was at her worst.
"How was the first day?" he asked carefully, like he was approaching something dangerous.
Eleanor closed her laptop and smiled. Not the cold smile she'd used in the boardroom. A real smile. The kind that didn't quite reach her eyes.
"It was productive," she said.
Marcus nodded slowly. He unpacked the food and sat in the chair across from her desk. He didn't ask for details. He didn't need to. Her brother had spent two years watching her rebuild herself from nothing. He knew exactly what productive meant.
It meant devastating. It meant she'd won. It meant someone was bleeding.
"I'm proud of you," Marcus said quietly.
Eleanor felt something crack inside her chest again. Not breaking this time. Just bending a little. Just allowing herself to feel the weight of what she'd done.
"Marcus, there's something you need to know," she started, but he held up his hand.
"Before you say anything, I need to tell you something first," he said, and his voice had changed. Gone serious. "I got a call today from someone I haven't talked to in years. Someone who used to be connected to the Blake family. Someone who knows things about Harrison's past. About why he really pushed you away."
Eleanor's entire body went rigid.
"She wants to meet with you," Marcus continued. "Tonight. Before you have any more contact with Harrison. She said it's important. She said you need to know the truth before everything gets more complicated."
"Who is she?" Eleanor whispered.
Marcus pulled out his phone and showed her a name and address.
Eleanor read it and felt the world tilt beneath her feet.
Because the woman Marcus was showing her was someone Eleanor thought was dead. Someone from Harrison's past. Someone who'd disappeared the same month Harrison had pushed her away.
Someone who'd been his mother's closest friend. Someone who'd been there when his father died.
Someone who knew exactly what had broken him.
And she was waiting to meet Eleanor at eight o'clock tonight.