Chapter 4 THE DEAL

DANIEL'S POV

The hospital corridor is too bright, buzzing with a sound that lives inside my skull. The click of the door behind me is the sound of a cell locking. Maya's words echo. Get out.

She knows. Not everything, but enough. She saw Lily's picture. She did the math. The math I've been running for five years, a frantic calculation that never added up to anything but this moment, right here, in the smell of antiseptic and failure.

I lean against the cool wall, closing my eyes. Not against the headache, but against the memory. It always starts with the rain.

Six years ago. The rain was biblical. My start-up, the one I'd poured my soul and Maya's savings into, had just collapsed. The servers were sold, the office empty. I sat in my car outside our apartment, unable to go in and tell her we'd lost everything. Her faith in me was this shining, fragile thing, and I had to shatter it.

My phone rang. An unknown number.

"Daniel Thorne?" A woman's voice, smooth as good whiskey. Unforgettably familiar.

"Clara?"

A light laugh. "You remember. I heard about your company. I'm so sorry." She didn't sound sorry. She sounded interested. "Listen, I'm back in town. My father's expanding the firm. We need a Human Resources Director who understands drive. Who isn't afraid of a rebuild. I thought of you."

It was a lifeline thrown from a ship I thought had sailed a decade ago. I was drowning. I took it.

The job at Finch Holdings was a sanctuary. A sleek office, a real salary, respect. Clara was a Vice President. She was polished, powerful, a far cry from the college girl I'd loved. She was also married. It felt safe. A professional favor between old friends.

Maya was relieved. We could breathe again. She decorated our new apartment, talked about starting a family. Her love for me was a warm, steady sun. But at work, Clara was a gravitational pull. She'd linger in my office, her perfume a cloud of ambition and nostalgia. She'd talk about her failing marriage, her loneliness. She'd touch my arm for just a second too long.

"You're the only real thing in this place, Daniel," she whispered once, her hand on my wrist.

I pulled away. "Clara, don't. I'm married."

Her smile never faltered. "I know. I'm just... thankful for you."

Then, eight months after I started, she called me into the executive suite. Not her office, her father's. The old man was a silhouette against the window. Clara did the talking.

"We're restructuring, Daniel. Some of the new hires you championed... my father isn't convinced. He's talking about streamlining the department. Bringing in his own guy."

Ice filled my veins. "Streamlining?"

"It's not my call," she said, her eyes full of fake sympathy. "Unless I can convincingly argue for your unique value. Make him see you as... indispensable."

The threat was crystal clear. The job, the salary, the fragile stability I'd built for Maya-it was all a toggle switch in Clara's manicured hand.

That night, she "needed to discuss strategy." At her penthouse. Her husband was away.

One drink. Two. The view was a million city lights. Her touch wasn't accidental this time.

"You belong here, Daniel," she murmured, her lips against my ear. "With people who understand what you deserve. Not in some... simple life."

I thought of Maya, probably asleep on our couch waiting for me, trusting me. I thought of the bank account, the loan sharks from the start-up quietly pacified. I thought of the shame of failing her again.

I made a choice. The worst choice of my life.

I told myself it was once. A transaction. A terrible price to pay to keep my world intact.

Nine weeks later, she told me she was pregnant. She was calm, holding the test like a receipt. "It's yours. My husband has been in Singapore for four months. So."

The world shrunk to the size of that little plastic stick.

"You'll be there for us," she stated. It wasn't a question. "Quietly. Or my father will learn about your creative accounting on the Anderson account, and you'll be lucky to get a job as a clerk. And Maya... well, she'll learn everything."

So, I built a prison. Two lives. For five years, I was the warden, keeping the walls from touching. Lily was born. A perfect, beautiful little girl with my smile. A smile that now felt like a brand. I provided. I visited. I was "Uncle Dan" who brought gifts and guilt in equal measure.

And Maya... God, Maya. Every time she looked at me with love, it was a knife twist. Every time she trusted me, the walls of my prison grew thicker. I started pulling away, not because I didn't love her, but because the fraud of me was too heavy to bring into the light of her goodness.

And then Liam came back.

Standing in that hospital room, my brother's presence was a shock to the system. He wasn't supposed to be here. He's the wanderer, the artist, the one who never fit. But there he was, solid and real in Maya's space, doing what I should have been doing. I saw the way he looked at her. Not like a brother-in-law. Like a man.

He always had. At our wedding, his toast was perfect, but his eyes on Maya held a quiet, resigned ache I chose to ignore. Now, that ache was gone, replaced by a fierce, protective focus. He saw her crumbling, and he stepped into the breach I created.

And Maya... she let him. She leaned into his quiet strength. She kept his jacket like a flag.

Now, pacing the empty hospital waiting room, my phone vibrates. Not a text. A photo.

It's a selfie of Clara and Lily, pouting in a chic children's boutique. The text follows: Lily needs a new dress for her recital. And you need to remember where your priorities lie. We're your family, too. Fix this mess with your wife. End it cleanly. Or I will end your career less cleanly. Your choice.

The threat is old, but the context is new. Before, the threat was to tell Maya. Now, the threat is to keep me from Maya. Clara doesn't just want me; she wants me completely, and she sees Liam as a rival for the fragments of my life she doesn't already own.

A clean end? There is no clean end. There's Lily. My daughter. There's the job that is the foundation of the life I share with Maya. There's the love for my wife that's a rotten, tangled thing, but it's still there, beneath the lies.

And there's Liam, in my chair, by my son's bed, holding the hand of the woman I'm desperate to keep.

I want out. Out of Clara's web. Out of this double life. I want to shove my brother out of that room and take my place. I want to explain to Maya, to make her see it was all for her, for us. But the words are ash. The evidence is a five-year-old girl with my dimples.

The door to Leo's room opens. Liam steps out, alone. He closes it softly behind him, then turns. His gaze, usually so easygoing, is a laser.

"He's asleep. Maya's resting in the chair," he says, his voice low. "You should go home, Daniel."

"This is my family, Liam. Not yours."

A flicker of something dangerous passes behind his eyes. "You have a funny way of showing it. Multiple ways, from what I can piece together."

He knows. He's always been too perceptive. Rage, hot and defensive, floods me. "Stay away from my wife."

"Or what?" He takes a step closer, his voice dropping to a whisper that's more threatening than a shout. "You'll fire me? Ruin me? You don't have that power here, brother. The only thing you have here is a son who asked for you when he was drowning, and a wife who's finally realizing she's been swimming alone for years. My only job right now is to make sure they don't drown for real. You deal with whatever hell you've made for yourself. But you don't get to bring it in there."

He turns and goes back into the room, leaving me in the buzzing, too-bright hallway.

Clara's text burns in my pocket. Liam's words burn in my ears. Maya's disappointed, knowing eyes burn in my soul.

I am trapped in the exact center of my own making. And for the first time, I see no way out that doesn't destroy everything. The only move left is to choose which everything gets destroyed.