Chapter 3: What the Note Said
Jason stared at the phone screen for three full seconds before he answered.
"I'll call you back." His voice had dropped to something flat and careful.
He ended the call before the other person could respond.
Ava still had the note in her hand, unread.
"Should I—"
"Go ahead," he said.
"It's relevant."
She unfolded it.
The handwriting was small and slanted, clearly rushed.
It read: *She came in earlier today.
Asked the host which table you'd reserved.
Said she was your fiancée.*
Ava looked up.
"Who did?"
Jason didn't answer immediately.
He turned toward the restaurant window, and through the glass Ava could see the dining room still full, candles still burning, the evening still happening for everyone else without interruption.
"Her name is Diane," he finally said.
"We ended things four months ago.
Or I did."
"She told them she was your fiancée?"
"She's done it before." He took the note back, folded it once, and put it in his jacket pocket.
"She has a way of inserting herself.
I should have told you before tonight."
Ava felt the embarrassment from inside the restaurant begin to reconfigure itself into something else.
"Is that who called just now?"
"No." He met her eyes.
"That was my lawyer."
The word landed with unexpected weight.
"Your lawyer," Ava repeated.
"Diane has been telling people we're still engaged.
To certain people — investors, a contractor I've been in talks with.
It's become a business problem." He said it plainly, without drama, which made it worse somehow.
"Tonight wasn't just a date for me.
I needed one evening that had nothing to do with any of that.
I wanted to sit across from someone who didn't know what I owned or what I was dealing with.
Someone who'd just be honest."
Ava absorbed this slowly.
"And instead I accused you of being cheap."
"You didn't know."
"That doesn't make it better."
"No," he agreed.
"It doesn't."
A cab rolled past.
Neither of them moved.
"I'm sorry," Ava said.
"I genuinely am.
Not because of what you own.
Because of what I assumed."
Jason looked at her for a long moment.
Something in his expression shifted — not forgiveness exactly, but the door to it, slightly open.
"Do you want to walk?" he asked.
"There's a place around the corner that does decent coffee.
Nobody knows me there."
Ava almost smiled.
"You sure about that?"
"Fairly." He started walking.
"Come on."
She fell into step beside him.
The night was cold and clear, and the street was quiet enough that their footsteps were the loudest thing on the block.
They were half a block from the coffee shop when Ava's phone buzzed.
She glanced at the screen out of habit.
It was a message from a number she didn't recognize.
*You should ask him why he really ended things with Diane.
The answer might surprise you.*
Ava stopped walking.
Jason noticed and turned.
"Everything okay?"
She looked at the message again, then at him.
May you like
"Someone just texted me," she said slowly.
"About Diane."
