Friday morning I'm three coffees deep and contemplating a fourth when Jessica calls.
"Have you heard from Claire?"
Her voice is tight with worry that makes my stomach drop in ways that have nothing to do with caffeine overdose.
"No, she won't return my calls. Has anything happened?"
"She's not answering mine either, and she missed her doctor's appointment yesterday. She never misses appointments." Pause. "I'm worried about her."
My hands go cold. "What kind of doctor's appointment?"
"That's none of your business." But there's something in her voice—concern mixed with knowledge she's deliberately not sharing. "Just—if you actually care about her instead of just feeling guilty, find her and make sure she's okay."
The call ends, and every instinct I have is screaming danger. I try her apartment again. The doorman finally admits she left two days ago with a suitcase, refused to say where she was going, looked "upset but determined."
I call her parents because I'm desperate and desperate men do stupid things. Her mother answers on the third ring.
"Lysander?" Mrs. Chen sounds equally concerned. "Claire called Wednesday saying she needed time away but wouldn't say why or where. She sounded so upset."
"I fucked up, badly… Mrs. Chen, if you hear from her, please tell her to call me."
"What did you do?" Not accusatory, just tired. Like she's watched her daughter get hurt by men before and this is just another entry in a disappointing pattern.
"I can't explain over the phone. Just—please. If she calls."
I use every connection I have. Call in favors from investigators I've used for corporate work, the kind who find hidden assets in divorce cases and track down witnesses who don't want to be found. Track her credit cards, phone pings, any digital trail she might have left.
Nothing for two days. Then a hit—her credit card used at a motel near the Denver bus station. The Skyline Inn, a run-down place where people go to disappear when they can't afford to disappear properly.
I'm there in fifteen minutes, breaking approximately twelve traffic laws and not caring.
The desk clerk is suspicious until I show my ID and explain I'm worried about a friend, which is technically true if you define "friend" loosely enough to include "woman I got pregnant and then spectacularly betrayed."
"Room 237. But mister?" He leans forward conspiratorially. "She asked not to be disturbed and said she's checking out in the morning. Whatever you did, maybe give her space?"
"I can't do that."
I climb the stairs two at a time because the elevator looks like a crime scene waiting to happen. Stand outside 237 with my heart trying to escape through my ribcage, trying to figure out what to say.
The truth, maybe? For once in my catastrophically dishonest life. I knock:
"Claire, it's me. Please, I need to know you're okay."
Silence. Then footsteps—slow, reluctant, the sound of someone who desperately doesn't want to answer but can't ignore knocking forever. The door opens a crack, the safety chain still engaged because she's smarter than I deserve.
She looks destroyed. Eyes red and swollen from crying, face pale without makeup, hair unwashed and pulled into a messy bun. Wearing sweatpants and a hoodie that might be mine, wrapped in a motel blanket despite the room being warm.
"How did you find me?" Her voice is hoarse, wrecked.
"Credit card ping. Claire, what are you doing here?"
"Hiding from you and from everything. From decisions I'm not ready to make." She won't meet my eyes. "How did you even know to look?"
"Jessica called and said you missed an appointment. She's worried."
Something flashes across her face—panic, maybe, or raw fear. "Tell her I'm fine, and leave, please."
"Not until you tell me what's going on." I see her suitcase by the door, packed and zipped. "Where are you going?"
"Away. Boston, maybe. My cousin lives there, and I need—" Her voice cracks like breaking glass. "I need to not be in Denver anymore. can't do this, can't watch you with her, work for you, and keep pretending I'm okay when I'm systematically falling apart."
"Let me in, please. Let's talk about this."
"There's nothing to talk about." But her hand is shaking on the door chain, betraying everything she's trying to hide. "You made your choice and you chose her again. Right there in your office where we used to—" She stops as she can't finish.
"That's not—Caroline and I aren't together. That was a mistake, a moment of weakness—"
Her eyes finally meet mine, devastating. "A moment that told me everything I needed to know about where I actually stand with you, which is nowhere. I stand nowhere."
She's closing the door but I see something on her nightstand through the crack. Small box, distinctive pharmacy packaging: a pregnancy test. My heart stops, like someone pulled the plug on my circulatory system.
"Claire. Is that—"
"None of your business." She tries to close the door but I block it with my foot, years of door-to-door sales experience finally paying off.
"Are you pregnant?"
"I said it's none of your business." Panic blooms across her face with the subtlety of a nuclear explosion, confirming everything.
"Let me see the test!"
"No."
"Claire—"
"I SAID NO!" Her voice breaks completely, shatters into pieces I caused. "You don't get to know and be part of this. You made your choices, now I'm making mine."
"If you're pregnant, if that baby is mine—"
"It's not yours. It's mine, only mine." She's crying now, trying to force the door closed despite my foot blocking it with probably unwise determination. "Leave, Lysander. Please just leave me alone."
"Not until you tell me. I need to know—"
The chain breaks under the pressure. Metal snapping, door flying open, me stumbling into the room while she backs away with genuine fear in her eyes.
The test box is right there on the nightstand. Mocking me with its presence. I reach for it but she's faster. Grabs it, clutches it to her chest with both hands.
"Please," I'm begging now, completely shameless. "Claire, please, I need to know if we're having a baby. I have a right—"
"You have NO rights!" She's sobbing, backing toward the bathroom with defensive body language that makes me feel like the worst person alive. "You lost those rights when you fucked her in the office where we—where you said—"
She can't finish. Just stands there holding the box, tears streaming down her face, looking at me with the kind of devastation that will haunt my nightmares forever.
"—Where you said you had feelings for me, where you made me believe I mattered." Her hands tighten on the box. "And then she showed up and suddenly I didn't matter at all."
"That's not true—"
"Why did you sleep with her?" The question detonates. "Why did you let her into your bed when you knew—you had to know—that I was coming back? That it would destroy me!"
"I didn't think—"
"You never think about how your choices affect people! You just do whatever feels good in the moment and then act surprised when everything explodes." Her voice climbs to something raw.
She's right. She's completely, devastatingly right.
"I'm sorry—"
"Sorry doesn't unfuck Caroline in the office where I gave you everything." She's moving toward the door now, still clutching the box. "It doesn’t make me not pregnant with your baby while you're still in love with someone else."
The confirmation lands with physical force.
"You are pregnant."
"Get out."
"Claire—"
"GET OUT!" She's at the door now, opening it wide. "Get out or I'm calling security. I'm leaving Denver tonight. You'll never find me, and you'll never know if this baby is yours because you don't deserve to know."
"You can't just—"
"Watch me."
The door slams in my face. I stand there in the motel hallway, hearing her sob through the thin walls, knowing I just lost everything that actually mattered. Again. Will there be at least one moment when I don’t destroy anything?