Page 90 of Sexting His Assistant

The night Nina left angry in a car I arranged and spent the drive home texting another man out of spite.

Alina reaches me before I can speak. She rises onto her toes and kisses my cheek.

I don’t move.

The scent of her perfume hits me, too sweet, too familiar from a night I barely remember and now resent being forced to recall.

“Baby,” she says, smiling wide enough for the hallway to notice, “guess what?”

Alina’s hand presses more deliberately against her stomach.“I’m pregnant,” she announces.

The hallway beyond us continues in fragments: the low murmur of employees, the distant chime of an elevator, Meredith’s voice somewhere behind the column. Ordinary sounds from a world that apparently has not realized mine has just been split open again.

I look at Alina. Then at her hand.

Then at Nina. That’s the mistake.

Because Nina sees me look.

Her face does not crumple. She’s too proud for that. Too disciplined in her own way. Instead, her mouth curves slightly, a small, terrible attempt at politeness that does not reach her eyes.

“Well,” she says softly, before I can say a single word, “congratulations.”

Then she steps back. Just one step.

Enough to make the distance feel permanent.

11

NINA

I cannot believe I missed him.

That’s the thought that keeps hitting me while Alina Karelin stands in the middle of the hallway with one hand on her stomach and Luka Kazan’s name in her mouth, announcing that he’s her baby daddy.

I missed him.

For two weeks, I acted as if I did not. I sent emails. I answered calls. I watched his staff move around his absence like a body moves around a wound. I sent him stupid videos because I didn’t know what else to do with the ache of not seeing him, because a TikTok of a dog walking badly was easier than saying, are you healing, are you sleeping, are you thinking about the boardroom, are you thinking about me? We even sexted. The thought actually makes me cringe. When I was baring my all for him, he was hooking up with someone else?

And all that time, I told myself distance was sensible.

That Misha was right. That Luka Kazan was dangerous in ways I was only beginning to understand.

Then he walked back into the office today with his shoulder in a sling, looking pale and severe and furious at the weakness of his own body, and my heart had done the stupidest thing.

It had lifted. Like I was glad. Like I had been waiting.

Like the last two weeks had been a held breath and the sight of him had finally let me inhale.

I hate myself for that now.

Because standing in front of us is Alina Karelin, glossy and trembling and very publicly pregnant.

Pregnant.

The word echoes in my head with the sickening force of a door slamming shut.

I hear myself say congratulations. I even sound calm.