Chapter 10

Declan stood in the deserted hallway, the faint sting on his cheek a stark physical reminder of the impossible. He watched Cayla's retreating back, her steps surprisingly steady, until she disappeared around the corner. He couldn't move. He couldn't speak. His mind was a blank, white canvas, refusing to process what had just happened.

A slap. Cayla. She had slapped him. His fiancée. The quiet, compliant, endlessly supportive woman who had been by his side for ten years. The woman who had never once raised her voice, let alone her hand. He touched his cheek, the lingering heat a testament to her fury. How could she be so angry? He had just tried to help her. To calm her down. To remind her of them.

He replayed the kiss in his mind. A logical solution, he had thought. A familiar gesture to defuse the situation, to remind her of their bond, to bring her back to earth from whatever emotional precipice she was teetering on. He had been trying to protect her, to protect their professional image. He had been trying to protect them. He genuinely believed she was simply overwhelmed, and that a moment of physical intimacy would ground her, bring her back to him. He was trying to show her he still cared, in his own way. He thought that was what she wanted.

"You're disgusting." Her words, raw and filled with contempt, echoed in his ears. What was disgusting about trying to comfort someone? To... to show affection? He didn't understand. He never understood emotions. He operated on logic, on efficiency, on strategy. And his strategy had just blown up in his face.

"Declan? Everything alright?" Kisha's voice, hesitant and small, broke through his daze. She stood at the end of the hallway, her eyes red-rimmed, her face still pale from the earlier public humiliation. She looked fragile, vulnerable.

He forced himself to compose his features, to push Cayla's shocking outburst out of his mind. "Fine, Kisha," he said, his voice clipped. "Just a minor disagreement. Go home. Get some rest." He didn't want to explain. He didn't want to talk about Cayla, about the unexpected, violent rupture that had just occurred.

He tried to go back to his office, to immerse himself in work, but his mind kept circling back. Cayla. Her fury. Her quiet, desperate words, "You've always seen me as a tool, haven't you, Declan?" Was that really what she thought? He didn't see her as a tool. He saw her as... indispensable. The one person who understood his vision, who could translate his abstract ideas into concrete reality. The one who made his life work. That wasn't a tool. That was... a partner. A life partner. Wasn't it?

He pulled out his phone, his thumb hovering over her contact. He needed to talk to her. To explain. To apologize, perhaps. He hadn't meant to hurt her. He just wanted things to go back to normal. He pressed call.

The automated voice message informed him: "The subscriber you have dialed is currently unavailable. Please try again later." His heart lurched. Unavailable. That wasn't like Cayla. She always had her phone on. Always.

A cold dread began to seep into his bones. He called again. Same message. Again. Still unavailable. A tremor of unease started in his stomach, spreading through his chest. This was beyond a tantrum. This was... different.

He tried to remember the last time he had called her. Not for work. Not for a schedule update. A personal call. He couldn't. He realized, with a sickening lurch, that Cayla was always the one who called him. To remind him of appointments, to check if he' d eaten, to ask if he needed anything. He rarely, if ever, initiated contact in their personal life. He had simply expected her to be there. Always.

He didn't even know where she lived now. She mentioned "staff housing" when he found her in the hallway earlier. A temporary dorm room. He hadn't paid attention. He had assumed she would, eventually, come back to the condo. To him. He realized, with a horrifying clarity, that he hadn't known her address outside of their shared apartment in years. He had taken her constant presence, her unwavering devotion, so completely for granted, that he hadn't even bothered to know the basic details of her independent existence. Because, for him, she didn't have an independent existence. She was just... Cayla. His Cayla.

A suffocating wave of panic washed over him. He felt like he was drowning, the air suddenly thick and unbreathable. She was gone. Not just from the firm, not just from the condo, but from his life. The sheer emptiness of that realization was a physical pain, sharp and unexpected. He had always been in control, always rational, always logical. But now, without her, his world felt like it was spiraling into chaos. His carefully ordered life, his perfectly functional existence, had relied entirely on her quiet, steady presence. And now that presence was gone.

He remembered her eyes, burning with a cold, clear resolve as she walked away. Not the eyes of a woman having a tantrum. The eyes of a woman saying goodbye. A final, absolute goodbye. The thought sent a jolt of icy fear through his veins. No. This couldn't be happening. He wouldn't let it.

He stumbled out of the firm, his mind racing. Staff housing. He knew the general location. He would find her. He had to find her. He couldn't imagine his life without her. The thought sent a wave of nausea through him. He had never considered it before. He had never had to.

He reached the staff housing building, the rows of identical doors mocking him with their anonymity. He tried her name at the front desk. "Cayla Norris? Transferred out this morning, sir. For the Detroit project."

Detroit. The word hit him like a physical blow. She was really gone. Gone to another city. Gone from his life. He felt a sickening lurch in his stomach, a profound sense of loss that left him breathless. He had taken her love, her loyalty, her very being, and treated it like an inconvenience. And now, he had lost her. And the terrifying part was, he didn't even know how to begin to get her back. The world, without Cayla, suddenly felt impossibly vast and terrifyingly empty.