"Your mother has a standing reservation at Le Bernardin every Thursday evening."
James spreads a calendar across the coffee table, his penthouse glittering around us like the inside of a jewelry box. Floor-to-ceiling windows frame the city in lights and shadows, and I perch on the edge of his leather sofa, acutely aware of every inch of space between us.
"My father frequents the same restaurant. Different nights, but the maître d' owes me a favor. We arrange an overlap, a shared table."
He loosens his tie—a small gesture, almost unconscious—and I find myself watching the way his fingers work the knot. The intimacy of it catches me off guard.
"You want to strand them together over seafood and hope romance blooms between the appetizers and dessert?"
His laugh is low, unexpected, a rumble that vibrates somewhere behind my sternum. "I want to create proximity. Romance is their responsibility."
I pull the calendar closer, studying the grid of dates and obligations. Our shoulders nearly touch as we both lean over the table, and the heat radiating from his body makes concentration difficult.
"The opera," I say, pointing to a Friday. "The Met is doing La Traviata. Your father has a box, and my mother pretends to hate opera but secretly loves the drama of it. If we arrange for them to share the box while we conveniently get delayed elsewhere—"
"That could work." James reaches across me to make a note. His cologne hits my senses, and my stomach lurches with the violent nausea that has become my constant companion. "We arrive late, apologize profusely, and spend the evening watching them instead of the stage. If there's chemistry, they won't be able to hide it in a private box for three hours."
"And if there isn't chemistry? If we've imagined the whole thing?"
"Then we've lost nothing except a few evenings of pretending to enjoy each other's company." His dark eyes meet mine, and the challenge in them makes my pulse quicken. "Though I suspect the pretending won't be as difficult as you'd like to believe."
"Don't flatter yourself, Calloway. I'm an excellent actress when motivated, and freedom is quite the motivation."
"Freedom." He says the word like he's tasting it. "Is that really what you want? To disappear back to Vienna and pretend none of this ever happened?"
"I want my life back. The one I built before your sister's driving killed my brother and set this whole nightmare in motion."
James's expression shutters, that careful control sliding back into place like armor. I should feel satisfied—I came here to strategize, not to forget that we're enemies bound by circumstance and nothing more.
But the silence that follows feels like a loss.
"The restaurant, then the opera," he says, his voice clipped now. "Two opportunities within the month we agreed upon. We'll need to coordinate our public appearances to sell the engagement narrative while we work on their relationship behind the scenes."
"Fine. What else?"
We spend another hour mapping out logistics—charity events where our parents might cross paths, business dinners that could become something more intimate, weekend gatherings at the Hamptons house where proximity becomes unavoidable. James takes notes with methodical precision, and I find myself studying him when I should be focusing on the plan.
He's dangerous, I remind myself. He's Lucy's brother. He's the man I'm trying to escape.
But my body doesn't seem to care about logic.
"I need a drink," James says finally, pushing back from the table. "Scotch? Or something less aggressive?"
"Water is fine. I'm not here to socialize."
He disappears toward the kitchen, and I'm left alone in the vast expanse of his living room.
I wander toward the windows, drawn by the glittering cityscape, and a wave of dizziness washes over me. That's when I see it.
A framed photograph on the bookshelf, half-hidden behind a crystal decanter. Two faces, caught mid-laugh. James, younger by several years, his arm slung around the shoulders of a woman with his same dark hair and sharp cheekbones.
Lucy.
The room tilts.
I reach for the shelf to steady myself, but my hands aren't working properly. They're shaking, trembling like leaves in a storm, and the edges of my vision are going dark and fuzzy.
She took him from me.
The photograph blurs. Lucy's laughing face becomes something monstrous, and I'm not in James's penthouse anymore.
I'm at the cemetery, watching dirt hit my brother's coffin. I'm in the restaurant bathroom, staring at two lines on a plastic stick. I'm everywhere and nowhere, fragmenting into pieces that don't fit together anymore.
My chest tightens like a fist closing around my lungs.
I slide down the bookshelf until I'm sitting on the cold floor, my hands shaking so violently I can hear my rings clicking against each other.
Will. Will. Will.
His name pounds through my skull like a heartbeat, and I'm drowning, I'm dying, I'm—
"Caroline."
James's voice cuts through the static. He's crouching in front of me, his face level with mine.
"Look at me." His hand hovers near my shoulder, not quite touching. "Caroline, I need you to look at me and listen to my voice."
"I can't—" The words come out broken, gasped. "I can't breathe, I can't—"
"You can." His voice is steady, calm, an anchor in the chaos. "In for four. Hold for four. Out for four. Count with me."
In for four. My lungs stutter and catch.
Hold for four. The darkness at the edges recedes slightly.
Out for four. The breath comes out ragged, broken.
"Again," James says, and his hand finally makes contact—gentle pressure against my knee, grounding me in my body.
We breathe together. In. Hold. Out. In. Hold. Out. The rhythm becomes a lifeline, something to cling to while the panic slowly, reluctantly loosens its grip.
I don't know how long we stay like that—me crumpled on his floor, him crouched beside me, counting breaths with the patience of someone who has done this before.
"How did you know?" I manage.
James is quiet for a moment. His hand is still on my knee, warm and solid, and he doesn't move to withdraw it.
"Lucy had them too." His voice drops to something barely above a whisper. "I learned to help her through them when we were teenagers. She used to count in fours, said it was the only thing that worked."
The intimacy of the moment aches in my chest, settling into the space where hatred lives. It would be easier if he stayed the villain. If he remained cold and controllable and easy to despise.
Because I can't let this in. I can't let him become something more complicated than an obstacle to overcome.
So I pull myself to my feet, ignoring the unsteadiness in my legs, and I walk toward the elevator without looking back. My stomach roils with the familiar sickness that doesn't care what time of day it is, and I press a hand against my abdomen—against the secret growing there that James can never know about.
"Caroline—"
"I'll email you about the restaurant," I say, and the doors close between us before he can respond.