The news broke on a Tuesday morning, blaring from the flat-screen mounted on the beige wall of my hotel room.
"Randolph Enterprises in High-Stakes Gamble for the 'Twins' Legacy."
Bennett had leveraged the company's oldest assets-properties that had been anchored in his family for three generations-to secure a hostile takeover of a rival tech firm.
It was reckless. It was borderline criminal.
And he was doing it because Elia had whispered in his ear that her unborn twins deserved an empire that spanned the globe.
My phone buzzed against the nightstand.
It was his mother, Mrs. Randolph. I let it go to voicemail.
I could imagine her voice, shrill and terrified, asking me to talk sense into him. But I had no sense left to give, and certainly no influence.
A sharp knock on the door interrupted the news anchor's speculation about Bennett's sanity.
I checked the peephole. It wasn't room service.
Elia stood in the hallway, wrapped in a cashmere coat that likely cost more than my first car. She looked perfectly put together, her skin glowing, her hands resting protectively over her stomach.
I opened the door. "What do you want?"
"Can I come in?"
She didn't wait for an answer. She breezed past me, her perfume-a heavy, floral scent that Bennett once claimed gave him a migraine-filling the small, impersonal room.
"Cozy," she said, her eyes sweeping over my unmade bed and the half-packed suitcase. "Bennett told me you were staying here. He thinks you're just cooling off."
"I'm leaving, Elia. Permanently."
She laughed.
It wasn't a warm sound. It was the sharp, delighted noise of a child pulling the wings off a fly.
She sat on the edge of the desk, swinging her legs.
"He's doing this for me, you know," she said, gesturing to the TV where Bennett's face flashed alongside plummeting stock graphs. "Risking everything. His reputation. His freedom. All for our babies."
"He's going to go to jail," I said, my voice flat. "Or lose the company. Or both."
"He's romantic like that," Elia sighed. "He told me he'd burn the world down if I asked him to. It's almost pathetic, isn't it?"
I froze. "Pathetic?"
She looked at me, her eyes devoid of the innocence she projected when Bennett was around.
"Oh, come on, Kelsey. You lived with him for two years. You know how desperate he is to be the hero. He needs to save someone."
She tilted her head, a shark-like smile playing on her lips.
"First it was you, the struggling artist. Now it's me, the damsel with the golden heirs."
She hopped off the desk and walked toward me, stopping inches from my face.
"He's not a husband, Kelsey. He's a tool. A very rich, very stupid blunt instrument. And right now, he's hammering exactly where I tell him to."
My stomach churned. "You don't love him."
"I love what he can give me," she whispered. "And I love that he is currently dismantling his own legacy just to prove he loves me more than he ever loved you."
She patted my cheek. Her hand was cold.
"Enjoy Paris. I hear it's lovely when you're alone."
She left, the door clicking shut softly behind her.
I stood there for a long time, staring at the wood grain of the door. My chest ached, not from jealousy, but from a profound, sickening pity.
Bennett was destroying himself for a woman who viewed him as nothing more than a credit card with a pulse.
I grabbed my phone. My fingers trembled as I dialed his number.
I didn't want him back. I just didn't want him to die.
It rang once. Twice. Three times.
"What?" Bennett's voice was breathless, angry. Background noise roared behind him-shouting, the frantic trill of office phones.
"Bennett, listen to me," I said. "You have to stop the takeover. Elia doesn't care about the legacy. She's using you. She just told me-"
"Stop it," he snapped. "God, Kelsey, are you that jealous? I'm in the middle of the biggest deal of my life. I'm securing my children's future."
"She called you a tool, Bennett. She said you're pathetic."
"The only pathetic thing here is you calling me to spread lies because you can't handle that I moved on!" he shouted. "Don't call me again unless it's to apologize."
The line went dead.
I looked at the phone screen. The call had lasted forty seconds.
"I tried," I whispered to the empty room.
I walked over to the suitcase and zipped it shut.
The sound tore through the silence like the zipper on a body bag.
