She paused.
“I didn’t call a car.”
“No, ma’am.” The driver’s voice was gentle. “Mr. Blackwell did.”
Olivia looked past him.
Inside the car, Ethan Blackwell sat in the shadows, wearing a charcoal overcoat and an expression so still it almost seemed formal. Billionaire philanthropist. Founder of the Blackwell Foundation. A man she had met years earlier at a charity gala when she was still Liam’s wife, still the woman behind the speeches, still invisible in the ways powerful men preferred their wives to be.
Ethan opened the opposite door and stepped onto the curb.
He did not rush toward her. He did not touch her. He simply looked at her with a steadiness that did not demand performance.
“I saw the cameras turn,” he said. “I thought you might want a quieter exit.”
For the first time all evening, Olivia’s control trembled.
Just slightly.
“You shouldn’t get involved.”
“I’m not involved.” Ethan glanced toward the ballroom doors, where the first photographers had appeared. “I’m offering transportation.”
A flash went off.
Then another.
Liam’s voice came from behind her.
“Olivia, wait.”
She closed her eyes.
The twins moved again.
Ethan did not step in front of her. That mattered. He gave her room to choose whether she would turn.
She turned.
Liam stood on the sidewalk in his tuxedo, his bow tie slightly crooked, his face pale beneath the Plaza’s gold light. Khloe remained behind him near the doorway, arms folded across her chest, her beautiful face sharpened by humiliation.
“Is it mine?” Liam asked.
The question was so ugly in its smallness that even one of the photographers lowered his camera.
Olivia felt something in her chest go quiet.
Not broken.
Finished.
She looked at him for a long moment.
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