Chapter 496
Chapter 495:
“You should have done exactly what you just did,” Jocelyn said. She rose onto her toes and kissed him — hard, brief, and full of conviction. “You should have let me see. You should have been clear. You should have chosen me, publicly and absolutely.” She smiled against his mouth. “And you did p>
The tension broke. Gaston laughed — that rare, unguarded sound — and lifted her off her feet, spinning her in a wide circle that sent a stack of data printouts fluttering across the floor.
“Tuesday at nine,” he reminded her, setting her down. “Statistically optimal p>
“And hopefully no further interruptions,” Jocelyn said.
But across the city, in a Park Avenue apartment that smelled of expensive perfume and quiet desperation, Chloe Monroe was already making other plans.
She sat on her sofa, phone clutched in both hands, staring at the declined call with an expression of pure, concentrated hatred.
𝘙е𝖺𝘥 𝖿𝘳e𝗲 n𝗼𝗏𝖾𝗹s оո.с𝗼𝘮
“You think you’ve won,” she whispered to the empty room. “You think she’s safe. You think you can simply cut me off p>
She stood. She walked to her desk, opened a drawer, and retrieved a leather-bound address book. She found a page marked with a silk ribbon, and a number she hadn’t dialed in years.
“Serena,” she said when the call connected. “It’s Chloe. I need your help. And your mother’s influence. The Breast Cancer Foundation luncheon next month — I need someone seated at my table. Someone specific p>
She listened. She smiled.
“Yes,” she said. “Jocelyn Wolfe Collins. And I need you to make sure she knows exactly who I am. What I was to him. What he still owes me, whether he admits it or not p>
She hung up and walked to the window, looking out at the city that had rejected her, the man who had discarded her, the future she had been denied.
She would have her revenge. Not through Gaston — he was lost to her, completely and pathetically devoted to his little hotel wife. But through Jocelyn. Through the woman who believed she had won. Through the hairline fractures in their perfect facade, the insecurities that Chloe knew existed because she had helped create them, years ago, in the careful and deliberate cultivation of Gaston’s dependence.
Tuesday at nine, she thought, a cold smile settling on her face. We’ll see what the data has to say about that.
The first thought Jocelyn had when her 6 AM alarm sounded was not of the quarterly earnings call, but of the promise she had made in Gaston’s arms beneath a sky of impossible green. A baby. The idea settled in her chest — a quiet warmth against the chill of the Manhattan morning. For a moment, she allowed herself to imagine it: a daughter with Gaston’s dark eyes, a son with her stubborn chin. It was a fragile, beautiful thing, and she held it close as she slid carefully out of bed, unwilling to wake him.
But reality, as always, was waiting.