His Favoritism Finally Broke Me

After that, the James Group steadied, and Hailey came back.

She wanted to build a home-decor channel, so Denys handed her the model units to shoot, let her cherry-pick the best brand deals, and had me stay up rewriting her scripts.

I asked him once. "Don't you think she's getting too far into our lives?"

He didn't even look up.

"Be the bigger person. Hailey just got back, she doesn't have anyone else."

So I was the bigger person, for a long time. Long enough to forget I could hurt too.

The next day, I went into the office.

I printed two documents.

One was a request to terminate the engagement-home design commission. The other was a notice withdrawing from the Southgate Hotel project team.

Lucretia saw them and set a coffee down on my desk.

"You're really leaving?"

"Yeah."

"And you're okay with that?"

I signed my name.

"No. But it's time I gave myself back to myself."

At noon the cafeteria was packed.

I'd barely sat down when Hailey carried her tray over and took the seat across from me.

There were shadows under her eyes, like she'd cried all night.

"Sally, does your foot still hurt?"

I didn't answer.

She pushed a bottle of yogurt toward me.

"Denys said this is your favorite."

I looked at the yogurt.

I used to think it meant Denys remembered what I liked.

Later I learned he could recite that Hailey didn't eat cilantro down to the letter, but he could never seem to remember I'm lactose intolerant.

Hailey bit her lip.

"Last night Denys drove me to the hotel. We were up working on the Southgate plan."

I looked up.

"The hotel?"

She seemed to catch herself and rushed to explain.

"It's not what you think. I was too scared to be alone, so Denys stayed out in the living room with me."

Then, quieter, she added, "He's actually really worried about you."

Footsteps behind me. Denys set a box of medicine on my desk.

"Anti-inflammatories. Take them on schedule."

Hailey tilted her face up at him, her voice going soft.

"See? I told you Sally wouldn't really be angry."

Denys glanced at me.

"She just talks tough."

Hailey gave a light little laugh.

"I bet you last night that she'd cry."

Denys said flatly, "You lost."

He looked down at me.

"Our Sally's grown some nerve lately. She'll even blow up her own engagement party."

Listening to the two of them play off each other, I felt sick.

My wound, my humiliation, the ring I'd pulled off in front of everyone, all of it had become a joke in their mouths.

I set down my chopsticks.

"Denys."

He looked at me.

I said it calmly. "Let's break up."

For a beat, the cafeteria went quiet.

Hailey's eyes reddened at once.

"Sally, is it because of me?"

Denys cut her off. "You don't need to explain."

He watched me, his face cooling.

"Sally Fox, are you done making a scene?"

I picked up my tray.

"Done. So this is where it ends."

That afternoon the whole company was passing around the news that I'd called off the engagement.

Lucretia leaned in and dropped her voice. "Hailey was livestreaming a model unit just now, and a client's wife called her a homewrecker right there on camera."

My pen stopped.

"And then?"

"She took a fall. Denys carried her off to the hospital."

Lucretia scoffed.

"The whole performance, you'd think she'd broken a bone."

I was quiet for a few seconds.

"Did she hurt her hand?"

Lucretia gaped at me. "Sally, have they actually scrambled your brain?"

I didn't say anything.

Hailey lives off that account. If her hand was hurt, that really would be a problem.

I went to the hospital anyway.

The door stood open, Hailey propped up in bed — and the bandage was on her knee, nowhere near the hand I'd come about.