Part 5
Then the sound stopped.
No footsteps followed.
No door opened.
Nothing came into view.
Elena’s body began to shake harder.
Ronan saw it.
“Stay with me.”
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.”
“No.”
“You can.”
“I don’t know how.”
His face tightened.
“Just listen to my voice.”
“I don’t want to.”
“I know.”
“I don’t want to hear you.”
“I know.”
She pressed her cheek against the marble.
The cold made her teeth ache.
“I don’t want any of this,” she said.
For a moment, no one answered.
Then Gideon said, “Neither do we.”
Elena opened her eyes.
The sentence was so simple that it hurt.
She looked at Ronan again. He had returned to his desk but had not sat down. His hand rested on the leather folder there. The folder looked unopened. Everything in the office looked untouched, as if time had stopped the moment he saw her on the phone.
He looked exhausted now.
Not physically. Something else.
Like a man who had been waiting for a disaster he had believed he could prevent.
“What did you mean,” Elena asked, “when you said you knew?”
Ronan did not answer.
“You said you knew.”
“I meant I know you don’t want this.”
“No.”
He stared at her.
“You said you knew I was closing my eyes.”
“Elena.”
“You said you knew I was hurt.”
“I could see that.”
“You said you knew.”
His silence changed shape.
Gideon’s voice came through the phone. “Elena, focus on staying awake.”
“No,” she said.
Her voice was stronger now, not because she felt better but because fear had found something to hold.
“I want to know.”
Ronan’s fingers pressed into the desk.
The office behind him looked darker than before. The curtains did not move. The warm lamps did not flicker. There was nowhere for him to hide except inside his own restraint.
“I don’t know what happened tonight,” he said.
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“I know.”
“Then answer me.”
Elena heard the thinness in her own voice. The desperation. The way it made every word sound like a plea even when she wanted it to be an accusation.
Ronan looked down at the desk.
When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet.
“I knew you were afraid before tonight.”
The room seemed to contract around her.
She stared at him.
“What?”
“You told me.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“You did.”
“I would remember.”
“Not always.”
The words landed softly, almost kindly.
They hurt anyway.
Elena’s eyes filled again.
“Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Make me feel like I’m wrong about myself.”
Ronan’s face changed.
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“I’m not trying to.”
“But you are.”
Gideon said her name once, carefully.
Elena ignored him.
The hallway remained dark.
The cane remained where it was.
The white orchids lay in pieces around her.
Nothing in the room moved, but suddenly every object seemed to contain an accusation. The chair. The vase. The phone. The dress she had chosen because she had wanted to feel beautiful for an evening that had never happened.
Ronan said, “You called me two weeks ago.”
Elena went still.
“You were upset.”
“No.”
“You hung up after thirty seconds.”
“No.”
“You said someone had been in the apartment.”
Her mouth opened.
No sound came out.
Ronan watched her closely.
“I asked you to leave.”
“No.”
“I asked you to stay somewhere else.”
“No.”
“You said it was nothing.”
Elena shook her head.
The movement made the room tilt.
“No.”
“I wanted to believe you.”
“You didn’t call me back.”
The words came out before she could stop them.
Ronan’s expression broke.
Not completely. Not enough to make him look weak. But the control in his face cracked open just long enough for her to see how much the answer cost him.
“No,” he said. “I didn’t.”
“Why?”
He looked away.
The question waited.
His office was quiet around him. The desk. The curtains. The dark walls. The untouched glass of water.
Finally, he said, “Because I thought you were punishing me.”
Elena stared at him.
He did not defend himself.
“I thought you wanted me to chase you,” he said. “I thought you wanted me to feel guilty.”
Her throat tightened.
“And did you?”
“Yes.”
The word was immediate.
“I did.”
She looked down at the phone in her hand.
The screen shook with her breathing.
“You should have.”
“I know.”
“You should have called.”
“I know.”
“You should have come.”
“I know.”
Ronan closed his eyes.
Elena hated him for a second.
Then she hated herself for being relieved that he looked like he hated himself too.
The feelings tangled together until she could not separate them.
A noise came from the hallway.
This time it was not soft.
A brief, low scrape.
Elena’s whole body locked.
Ronan’s eyes flew open.
“Gideon?”
“I heard it.”
“What is it?” Elena whispered.
Neither man answered.
That was answer enough.
She pressed the phone against her mouth to keep herself from making a sound.
Her breath came hot against the glass.
The dark hallway seemed to pulse.
Something was there.
Or something had been.
Or something was waiting for her to look away.
Ronan’s voice came through the phone, low and deliberate. “Elena, listen to me. You are not going to the hallway.”
“I know.”
“You are not going to try to stand.”
“I know.”
“You are not going to hang up.”
“I know.”
“What are you going to do?”
She did not want to answer.
“Elena.”
“I’m going to stay here.”
“Say it again.”
“I’m going to stay here.”
“Good.”
The word almost broke her.
She closed her eyes.
Ronan made a sound under his breath.
“Elena.”
She opened them.
“I’m still here,” she said.
The office light reflected on Ronan’s face. He looked younger suddenly, though he was not young. His dark hair was neat, but one strand had fallen slightly out of place near his temple. His tie had loosened at the knot. The room around him still looked powerful, but he no longer did.
He looked like someone trying not to lose control because a woman on a floor far away had asked him a question he should have answered weeks ago.
Gideon’s voice came through the phone. “Elena, can you hear anything now?”
She listened.
The penthouse was silent.
She could hear the low hum of the refrigerator in the kitchen. The soft movement of air through the vents. Her own uneven breath.
Nothing else.
“No.”
“Okay.”
“What does okay mean?” she asked.
“It means I’m listening.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“No,” Gideon said. “It isn’t.”
The honesty of it frightened her more than false reassurance would have.
Ronan said, “Tell us where the front door is.”
Elena looked toward the private entryway, hidden beyond the far wall.
“There.”
“Can you see it?”
“No.”
“Can you see the hallway?”
“Yes.”
“Can you see the windows?”
“Yes.”
“Can you see the chair?”
“Yes.”
“Can you see the cane?”
Her eyes went to it.
“Yes.”
“Can you reach it?”
The question pulled a chill through her.
“Why?”
“I need to know what is close to you.”
“It’s not close.”
“How far?”
“Maybe six feet.”
“Too far?”
“Yes.”
“Can you move your leg?”
“No.”
“You said you could feel it.”
“I can feel it. That doesn’t mean I can move it.”
Ronan’s head lowered.
“Okay,” he said.
His voice changed with the word.
Not surrender.
Acceptance.
Elena noticed that. She did not know why it mattered, but it did.
She watched him look toward the door of his office.
“Are you leaving?” she asked.
He looked back immediately.
“No.”
“You should.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“You can’t stay on the phone forever.”
“I can stay now.”
The answer was too quick.
Too easy.
Her mouth trembled.
“You didn’t before.”
Ronan said nothing.
Gideon did.
“Ronan has been trying to find the right way back to you.”
Elena blinked.
The older man’s voice was still steady, but there was something beneath it. A warning, perhaps. Or a request.
Ronan looked toward the phone as if Gideon were standing in front of him.
“Don’t,” he said.
“Elena deserves to know he did not ignore her.”
“I did ignore her.”
“You made a mistake.”
“I made more than one.”
Elena listened.
The men had forgotten for a moment that she was there, or perhaps they had remembered too clearly. Either way, the truth slipped through them in fragments.
She pressed her cheek to the marble again.
“I don’t care,” she whispered.
Ronan stopped.
“Yes,” she said. “I do. But not now.”
The words left her tired.
“I don’t want to talk about before.”
“You don’t have to,” Ronan said.
“I just want to go home.”
His face changed.
The penthouse around her went quiet.
The city lights flickered in the glass.
Ronan’s eyes lowered.
“You are home,” he said.
Elena looked at the hallway.
“No,” she whispered. “I’m not.”
No one spoke.
The sentence remained in the room, too large for the phone screen, too large for the office, too large for the glass walls and marble and the skyline above the city.
A faint sound came from the far end of the penthouse.
Not a door.
Not a scrape.
A breath.
Elena stopped breathing.
The phone tightened in her hand.
Ronan saw everything in her face.
“Where?” he asked.
She could not answer.
“Elena, where?”
Her eyes moved slowly toward the windows.
The reflection in the glass showed her on the floor.
The chair.
The cane.
The scattered orchids.
And behind the reflected room, something darker than the room itself.
It might have been a shadow.
It might have been nothing.
She did not know.
She did not want to know.
Her voice came out as barely more than air.
“Ronan.”
“I’m here.”
The dark shape in the reflection did not move.
Her eyes filled.
“Don’t say that unless you mean it.”
Ronan stood completely still in his office.
His face had gone pale beneath the warm lights.
“I mean it,” he said.
Elena held the phone against her heart.
Her eyes began to close again.
On the screen, Ronan leaned forward, his hand braced against the polished desk, every trace of distance stripped from his voice.
“Elena.”
She forced her eyes open.
The city beyond the glass remained bright.
The orchids lay broken around her.
The cane rested beside the chair.
Somewhere in the apartment, something waited without making a sound.
May you like
And Elena, still on the marble floor, breathed once more into the phone.
“I’m still here.”
