Two weeks.
That's how long it took Kendall Morris to become part of the walls at Lumenvox.
She sat in on the Tuesday product sync, though she couldn't tell an API from an alphabet. She sat in on the Thursday investor prep, though she'd never read a term sheet in her life. She sat close to Holden in every photo — one shoulder just behind his, chin tilted at the exact angle her ring light had taught her.
On day three, I watched her hand him a cup of coffee without asking what he wanted. Oat milk latte, extra shot, one raw sugar. She didn't even look at the cup as she passed it. She was already laughing at something he hadn't finished saying.
She walked past my desk every morning. She never once asked what I drank.
I kept working. I kept my head down. I kept a list, though I didn't write it anywhere. Every meeting she attended. Every photo she stood in. Every time she said "we" about a product she couldn't spell.
Dana leaned over my monitor on Friday afternoon.
"You okay?"
"I'm working."
"That's not what I asked."
I kept typing. "I know."
She stood there for a second longer. Then she went back to her desk without pushing. That's why Dana was Dana.
---
I stayed late that night. Everyone else was gone by nine. The floor lights had dropped to the low motion-sensor glow they used after hours, and the only sound was the hum of the server rack down the hall.
I wasn't looking for it. That's the part I keep coming back to. I was pulling Q3 expense logs to cross-check a vendor invoice. Standard audit. Something I'd done a hundred times.
The pattern caught my eye by accident.
Repeat charges. Same platform. Small amounts, then larger ones. Then a $2,000 line item on a Tuesday night at 11:47 p.m.
A streaming platform. Live gifts.
I opened the account.
Username: HCSeattle88.
Holden Carlson. Seattle. Nineteen eighty-eight.
He hadn't even tried.
I clicked through the archived streams. There she was — Kendall, in a soft-lit bedroom that was supposed to look casual, laughing at the camera. The chat scrolled fast, but HCSeattle88 was easy to find. He'd tipped enough to be pinned.
*You look incredible tonight.*
*That color is my favorite on you.*
*Save one for me, K.*
And then, from her, out loud, into the microphone: "HC, you're too generous. Stop spoiling me." A small laugh. A tilt of the head. The exact one she gave him in press photos.
I took screenshots. All of them. Named the folder something boring so it wouldn't stand out on my drive.
Then I closed the laptop.
I sat in the dark of the office for a long time. My thumb moved against my knee without me telling it to. Three short. One long. Three short. One long.
Seven years.
On a livestream.
Under a username a child could crack.
---
The apartment was quiet when I got home. Holden was in the study, on a call. I heard his voice through the door — the warm one, the one he used to use with me before it got reassigned.
I didn't knock.
I went to the kitchen. Poured a glass of water I didn't drink. Set it down on the counter.
And then the lights went out.
All of them. The fridge stopped humming. The city outside the window flickered and went black in patches — a whole block gone, then another. A transformer somewhere. A grid problem. It happened in Seattle sometimes.
I stood still and waited for my eyes to adjust.
From the study, I heard Holden curse. A drawer opening. His phone flashlight clicking on. Then his voice — but it wasn't a work voice anymore. It had gone soft in a way that hit me before I could brace for it.
"Baby. Hey. Are you okay? Is your power out too?"
He was already in the hallway. I could see the beam of his flashlight sweeping the wall.
"Stay where you are, okay? Don't go outside. I'll come get you if you want. Just — just stay put."
He wasn't talking to me.
I hadn't heard my name in that voice in over a year.
I stepped into the hallway. His flashlight beam caught my chest, then my face. He didn't lower it.
"Holden."
"Not now, Veronica."
"We need to talk."
"I said not now."
"About us. About what I saw tonight. About the—"
"Move."
"Holden, please—"
He pushed past me.
It wasn't a shove, exactly. That's what I told myself for the first half-second. It was just an arm, moving through the space I was standing in, treating me like a door that had been left open in the wrong place.
My hip hit the corner of the kitchen island. My balance went. My hand shot out for the counter and missed. My forehead didn't.
There was a small, sharp sound — my skin against the edge of the stone.
And then a heat above my eyebrow. Not pain yet. Just heat.
Holden was already at the front door.
"I know, baby, I know. I'm coming. Just breathe for me."
He didn't look back.
He didn't ask.
The door clicked shut behind him and the apartment went silent again, except for the far-off wail of a car alarm somewhere down the hill.
I pressed my palm to my forehead. It came away wet.
I stood there in the dark, one hand on my face, one hand on the counter, and I did not move for a long time.
The blood was warm.
My thumb, against my thigh, tapped three short and one long.
