Chapter 6

Serena's POV

I looked at my own father. "You already knew they suspended me. You came here to help him throw me out."

He didn't answer. He turned to the security team and barked, "Get her out. Now. She's disrupting Mr. Hartley's workplace."

They came at me from every side. Hands grabbed both arms.

I fought back. In the struggle, my clutch hit the floor. Everything inside scattered.

Lip gloss. A packet of tissues. And a small, navy blue velvet box, worn soft with age.

The lid popped open on impact. A ring rolled out and came to rest directly at the toe of Ethan's custom leather shoe.

The ring he had proposed with, five years ago, when he had nothing.

Not a single diamond in it.

He had promised me then, eyes full, that the moment the funding came through, he would replace it with the largest pink diamond in the city.

I had believed him. I had kept that simple, unadorned band against my skin for five years. I hadn't even taken it off to shower.

Until yesterday, when he put a pink diamond on Cassandra's finger in front of the whole world, and I quietly tucked it away in its box so no one would see what a fool I had been.

Ethan looked down at it. Something moved in his eyes, just barely, just for a second.

Then Cassandra's fingers curled around his sleeve.

"Ethan... my chest feels so tight... I feel dizzy..."

Whatever had been in his eyes disappeared.

He turned without hesitation and gathered her up, carrying her toward the back room.

From the moment the ring had rolled out until now, he had not looked at it again. He had not said one word to me, still pinned under the hands of his security team.

"Take her out."

The head of security didn't need to be told twice.

I was dragged out of the building.

At the bottom of the steps, a hard shove sent me rolling down onto the rough concrete. My knees hit and split open. Blood soaked through my stockings immediately.

My clutch was thrown down beside me like refuse. The old velvet box landed near my hand.

I stretched out my scraped fingers toward it.

Above me, the massive LED screen on the outer wall of the building flickered on.

A breaking news chyron pulsed from the business channel, filling the street.

On screen, Ethan stood in the lights of a press conference. Cassandra sat beside him in a tailored designer suit, poised and composed.

The anchor's voice rang out clean and clear.

"Breaking news. Hartley Group today officially announces that Ms. Cassandra Hayes will assume the role of Executive President of the group. Mr. Hartley praised the groundbreaking project proposal that has stunned the industry as the product of Ms. Hayes's visionary and forward-thinking genius."

The screen cut to the cover of the project proposal.

Three months. My three months.

I was kneeling on cold concrete, blood from my knees mixing with grit from the ground.

The box was right there.

I looked up at the screen. The man I had loved for five years was leading the applause for her, his hands moving together with something that looked like pride.

My hand stopped in the air.

For a long time, I didn't move.

Then, slowly, I picked up the ring.

I put it back in the box.

Closed the lid.

And buried those five years of blindness along with it.

Ethan had reached far enough into my life to take even that from me. The right to check into a hotel.

At the first one, the front desk attendant scanned my ID and looked up at me with a changed expression.

"Ms. Walsh, there's a flag on your ID. It shows as reported lost."

At the second, I tried a different credit card.

Declined.

At the third, the attendant slid the card back across the counter.

"This account has been frozen. Would you like to try another method of payment?"