Chapter 3

The door opened. Adrian stood in the doorway, slightly out of breath. When he saw me, his shoulders dropped.

But then his brow furrowed, and his voice carried a mix of relief and reproach.

"Where did you go? I have been looking for you for almost two hours."

I did not answer. If he had really been in a hurry, he would have come after me the moment he said the wrong name, not after dinner, not after the photos, not after the guests had gone.

He stepped inside and saw the suitcase and boxes by my feet. His face changed. "Where are you going at this hour?"

I looked at him. My voice was flat. "I am moving out. The rest will be picked up tomorrow."

Adrian sighed first, then reached into his pocket and pulled out the navy ring box. He opened it. The ring lay inside, as if it had never been worn.

"All right," he said. "I made a mistake. I was nervous. You know I've never done this before. Take the ring. I'll clear it up tomorrow. I've already talked to Serena. She won't make things difficult for you."

"If you do not want to wear the one she tried on, I will have a new one made. A better diamond. Whatever setting you want."

He said all of this while finally looking me in the eye. His tone had the certainty of someone who believed he had already made a concession. He held the box out, waiting for me to take it.

"You talked to Serena," I said.

"Of course. She understands this is complicated."

"Did you tell her she isn't your fiancée?"

His thumb pressed against the velvet box. "I told her we'd handle the announcement tomorrow. There's no reason to create a second scene tonight."

There it was again. The scene mattered. The truth could wait.

"And the photographs?"

"My staff will deal with them."

"The guests who watched you put my ring on her hand?"

"Evelyn, enough. I said I'll deal with it."

He had an answer for every consequence except the one standing in front of him.

I looked at the ring. "Adrian, you want to get me a new ring with a better diamond. Do you think that is what I am upset about?"

He paused, like the question had derailed the response he had prepared. "Then what are you upset about?" He sounded genuinely confused.

I gave a small, quiet laugh. "I am serious about ending this. The ring is yours. Give it to her, sell it, throw it away. I do not care."

Adrian closed the box. His face shifted, and the patience on it hardened into something I had seen many times before. "Evelyn, I said I would get you a new one. If you do not like the stone, we can change it. If you do not like the setting, we can change that too. But you do this every time. You make a scene over something small and threaten to leave. Why can you not be more understanding?"

The way he said "every time" made my skin cold.

"Name one time I made a scene over nothing," I said.

He opened his mouth, then frowned as if I had asked him to produce a document he had misplaced. "That isn't the point."

"It is exactly the point. Every time you take something from me and give it to Serena, I object. Then you call my objection the problem."

"I have never taken anything from you."

"You did it tonight while looking at me."

His gaze dropped to the ring. For the first time, he seemed to understand that putting it back in the box had not erased the sight of it on Serena's finger. But the understanding lasted only a second.

"I was protecting everyone," he said. "Including you."

"You protected yourself from an awkward conversation."

I remembered something from a year ago. After the annual report came out, I found out I had been moved to a lower-priority team. The core client I had been handling was given to Serena. I went to Adrian, and he did not look up from his phone. "She needs to prove herself. You are capable. One client will not make a difference."

"That client took me eight months to land."

"You can find another one. I will keep an eye out for you next quarter." His tone was like he was calming a child. I stood there and could not find any words. He said "next quarter." He thought everything could be postponed.

That time, we broke up. I stayed in a hotel for three days, and he did not send a single message. Later I understood that he counted on me loving him too much. He knew I would always come back. Just like when he said, "I do not want a long-distance relationship," and I quit my job in Boston and moved to New York.

When I came back that time, he took my suitcase and said: "When I take over the family, you will be the Donna standing beside me. There will be more pressure than this. Evelyn, if you keep acting like this, how can I trust you with the Moretti name?"

Now Adrian stood in front of me with the same voice. "You've had your say. I'll get the ring remade," he said, looking at me like he had already given enough. "I have the family, the business, the company. I have pressure too. Can't you try to understand me and let this go?"

I had understood him for three years. I understood his father's expectations, his fear of looking weak, his need to prove that Serena had been wrong to leave him, and his belief that my love was the safest thing in his life because it demanded so little from him.

Understanding had become another word for surrender.

I looked at his face and realized he had never truly understood me.

He knew how I took my coffee. He knew I hated crowded elevators and called my parents every Sunday. He knew I kept backup batteries in every bag and read contracts twice. Those details had convinced me that he saw me.

But he did not know what any of them cost or meant. He did not know why I had stopped mentioning London. He did not know how often I checked his expression before stating an opinion. He did not know that every time he called me Serena, I spent the rest of the day wondering what I lacked.

Knowledge was not the same as care.

"I am serious about this, Adrian. I do not want a new ring. I do not want anything."

His phone lit up on the kitchen counter. Serena's name appeared above a message: Your father expects me to wear the ring at the office tomorrow. Bring it back tonight.

Adrian turned the screen facedown. "I'll return it to her until I correct the announcement. It doesn't mean anything."

That was his answer even now. He would put the ring back on Serena's hand to avoid one uncomfortable morning, then promise to tell the truth later.

As the elevator doors closed, his voice came through the gap: "It is cold out. Do not stay out too long. Come back when you are ready. I will be here."

The elevator went down, floor by floor. My phone lit up. Serena had posted another story using a photo taken earlier at the estate. Her hand held a champagne glass, the ring catching the light.

I liked the story, got into the taxi, and gave the driver the name of a hotel.