Three relocation apartments? I could give her three hundred with a single word. A few million in buyout compensation? If she wanted billions, I'd hand them over right now. None of that mattered. All I wanted was to understand how five years between us had just—changed.
But five words from her choked every last one of mine back down my throat.
My voice shook.
‘Mar……married?’
I searched Doris's eyes, over and over.
No reluctance. No one forcing her hand. Not a shred of what we'd been. Just bright want for the life ahead of her.
And tenderness……for another man.
‘That's right!’
She answered with her chin lifted, satisfaction written across her whole face.
‘Look—this is my fiancé, Hubert Chavez.’
She shoved the phone into my face before I could blink.
In the photo, she was nestled against a barrel-chested man with slicked-back hair, her expression shy and coy.
His thick fingers dug into her waist.
There was nothing remotely like affection in his eyes. Just possession. Just appetite.
Three years together, and Doris had never let me so much as hold her.
She always said she was saving everything for after the wedding.
And now……
‘Tch. Stare all you want—you couldn't learn that man's tricks in a hundred years.’
Oscar Pruitt let out a sigh beside her, shaped like pity but soaked in pride.
‘You know Grand Horizon Group, the company running the old-town redevelopment? Dory's future husband works there. The three relocation apartments our family's getting, all that buyout compensation? That's his pull.’
I frowned.
Grand Horizon was one of my subsidiaries. I'd been planning to sign it over to Doris today.
‘What's that look for? You don't believe it?’
Doris swiped through her phone, then tossed it straight into my lap.
‘See for yourself! That's him with the company executives.’
I lit the screen. The first photo had been taken at some upscale club. The date stamp said yesterday.
Working the room with a glass in hand, toasting everyone in sight, was the same Hubert Chavez who'd been holding Doris in that other picture.
And seated dead center—Tom Finch. Director of Grand Horizon's Strategic Planning Division, and the brother who'd built the company with me from nothing.
Doris was from this village, so I'd sent him here to handle the redevelopment buyout.
He had work to handle here today.
I'd come to make the formal proposal.
We'd planned to finish up and drive back to the office together.
I glanced at the time.
Less than an hour before he'd show up.
I kept swiping.
The last photo was taken at the old-town redevelopment site.
In the far corner of the frame, half-turned away from everyone and talking on the phone, was me.
‘See that?’
Doris had clearly noticed I'd reached the final picture.
She jabbed her finger at the figure in the corner—at ‘me’—and her voice climbed even higher.
‘That's Hub's boss. Young, successful, gorgeous. I can't even imagine how lucky the girl who marries him is gonna be.’
I looked at myself in the photo, crisp in a tailored suit.
Then I looked down at what I was actually wearing: faded work pants, a plain white T-shirt. I shook my head. No wonder she couldn't tell. Didn't even look like the same person.
‘Okay, enough! Give it back!’
Doris snatched the phone out of my hands.
The motion was rough enough to yank the chain from under my shirt collar.
It was a couple's necklace. The matching half of the one I'd given her years ago.
I'd never taken it off. Not once.
Doris saw it.
She went still for just a beat, something unreadable flickering behind her eyes.
