Chapter 278
Daron McKnight sat in the driver’s seat, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. He glanced out the window and spotted the couple exiting the building. He recognized Isolde instantly — her sharp silhouette was unmistakable. But the man beside her meant nothing to him. He saw the hoodie, the jeans, the unremarkable black car. The heavy rain blurred the details, and Daron, accustomed to luxury cars and tailored suits, dismissed the understated Volvo without a second thought. It never occurred to him to connect the dots to a Silicon Valley titan who famously shunned ostentation.
“Well, well,” Daron muttered, grabbing his phone. “Moving on to a broke college student, Isolde? That was fast.”
He snapped a photo through his rain-streaked window and zoomed in on the umbrella. It had a small NASA logo on it.
“Nerd love,” Daron laughed. “Pathetic.”
Inside the Volvo, the interior was quiet and warm, smelling of leather and rain.
𝘓𝗮tе𝘀𝘵 сh𝗮𝗉𝗍𝘦rѕ o𝗻 𝗴𝖺𝗅n𝘰𝗏𝘦𝗅𝘀.𝖼𝘰𝗺
Sterling handed her a small towel from the console. “For your hair.”
Isolde wiped her face. “Thank you.”
“You mentioned a daughter,” Sterling said as the car merged into traffic. “How old?”
“Five,” Isolde said, a softness entering her voice. “Her name is Effie.”
“Does she like LEGOs?” Sterling asked.
Isolde laughed. “She loves them. Especially the Technic sets. She builds the gearboxes without instructions.”
Sterling’s eyes lit up. “I’ll send her the new Mars Rover set. It’s not released yet — I have a prototype in my office.”
Isolde smiled, and real warmth flooded her chest. “She would lose her mind.”
The car arrived at Isolde’s apartment building. Sterling handed her the umbrella. “Keep it. You’ll need it.”
Isolde got out and watched the Volvo drive away, its taillights fading into the grey mist.
Just then, Daron’s Ferrari roared past and splashed a puddle of dirty water across her shoes.
Isolde glared at the red car. She knew that engine sound.
Daron was already typing. He sent the photo to a group chat named “The Inner Circle” — which included Grayson, Belle, and Victoria.
Caption: Saw the ex with her new boy toy. Looks like she’s scraping the bottom of the barrel. Some intern with a Volvo. Sad.
At the hospital, Grayson’s phone pinged.
He picked it up and looked at the photo.
He recognized the Volvo model immediately — the XC90 Excellence, over a hundred thousand dollars. The car you bought when you valued safety over showing off. He zoomed in on the man holding the umbrella. He didn’t recognize Sterling Stone; Sterling was notoriously low-profile and avoided press photos. But he saw the way the man held the umbrella, tilting it entirely over Isolde, keeping himself in the rain to shield her completely.
Belle leaned over his shoulder. “Oh, poor Isolde. Dating an intern? That’s embarrassing.”
Grayson felt a strange, sharp pang in his chest. It wasn’t pity. He told himself it was irritation — annoyance at her moving on so quickly, a slight to his own image. But the anonymous man’s quiet protectiveness, even in a grainy photo, struck a chord he didn’t want to acknowledge.
“She moves fast,” Grayson muttered.
He tossed the phone down onto the bedsheet. “Whatever. It’s her life.”
But his eyes kept drifting back to the darkened screen.
Isolde entered her apartment. It was quiet.
The babysitter, Mrs. Higgins, met her at the door. “She’s asleep. She had a hard day, poor thing.”
.
.