The billionaire I had secretly loved for nearly a year opened the wrong dressing room door and found me half-dressed, covered in bruises I had spent months hiding from everyone.

I called her back immediately.

Ethan stayed where he was — he didn't move closer, didn't ask to listen, just refilled my coffee and set it within reach and went back to the desk with his own phone, giving me the room without leaving it.

Claire Donovan picked up on the second ring.

"Ava?" Her voice was careful.

Measured.

The voice of someone who had learned to be very precise about what she said and to whom.

"Yes.

Thank you for reaching out."

"I almost didn't." A pause.

"I've been almost-not-doing things for eighteen months.

I'm tired of it."

"Marcus said you had something you didn't tell him."

"I told him the facts.

What Andrew did, the dates, what I reported and what happened after." She exhaled.

"What I didn't tell him is what Andrew said to me the night I submitted the complaint.

Before I was transferred.

He came to find me in the break room."

I pressed the phone closer to my ear.

"He said — and I'm going to say this exactly — he said, 'You're not the first person to try this, and you won't be the last.

But I want you to think very carefully about who people are going to believe.

A nurse with two years on the job, or the man who just saved the governor's grandson's life.'" She stopped.

"Then he smiled and poured himself a coffee and walked out."

The room was very quiet.

"He knew exactly what he was doing," I said.

"He'd done it before.

That's what he was telling me.

He wasn't even trying to hide it." Her voice tightened.

"There was a woman before me.

Before Patricia too.

Her name is Donna Reyes.

She worked in hospital administration.

She left the city entirely — moved to her sister's place in Arizona.

I tracked her down six months ago.

She won't come forward.

She's too afraid.

But she told me enough."

"Enough for what?"

"Enough that you should know this goes back further than anyone realizes.

Andrew has been doing this for at least five years.

Possibly longer." A beat.

"He chose his targets carefully.

Women who needed their jobs.

Women without powerful connections.

Women who had something to lose and no one in their corner with enough weight to make it matter."

I thought about what Marcus had said.

*She just needed someone with enough weight to make it matter.*

I looked across the room at Ethan, who was writing something at the desk, his back to me, deliberately not listening.

"Claire," I said.

"Will you say all of this on record?

Not just to the medical board — to the DA's office?"

Silence.

"I've wanted to for eighteen months," she said.

"I just needed to know I wasn't doing it alone."

"You're not alone." I said it before I'd finished deciding to.

"I'm giving my statement in the morning.

Patricia Wells is coming forward.

And the man whose foundation just gave Andrew an award tonight is currently on the phone with his legal team making sure this doesn't get buried."

Another silence.

Longer this time.

"Okay," Claire said.

"Okay.

Yes."

"Can you be at Carter Tower at seven a.m.?"

"I'll be there at six-thirty."

I ended the call and sat for a moment with the phone in my lap.

Ethan turned from the desk.

"Donna Reyes," I said.

"Do you know that name?"

He shook his head.

"She was before Claire.

Before Patricia.

Andrew's been doing this for at least five years." I looked at him.

"He picked women who had no one.

That was the strategy.

That was always the strategy."

Something moved through Ethan's expression — not surprise, but a kind of cold settling, the way a decision firms up when the last doubt is removed.

"Then we make sure," he said, "that the record goes back five years."

He picked up his phone and dialed.

It was nearly one in the morning.

"Daniel," he said, when someone answered.

"I need you to pull everything you can find on a Dr.

Andrew Vaughn going back to 2019.

Employment history, credentialing files, any civil actions, any sealed records you can get a motion on." A pause.

"I know what time it is.

I'll double the rate." He listened.

"Thank you."

He ended the call and looked at me.

"You should sleep," he said again.

"I know." I didn't move.

"He's going to come here in the morning.

Before your attorney arrives.

He'll want to talk to me privately before anything becomes official."

"I know."

"He'll be very calm.

He's always very calm when he's most dangerous."

"I know that too." Ethan set his phone down.

"Ava.

I need to ask you something, and I need you to answer honestly."

"All right."

"Is there anything he has over you?

Anything he's said he would do or use if you tried to leave?"

The question landed like a stone in still water.

I had never said it out loud to anyone.

"He told me," I said slowly, "that if I ever went to anyone, he would tell them I had been stealing from your company.

That he had evidence.

Fabricated evidence, but — he said by the time anyone proved it was fabricated, my career would already be finished."

Ethan's face went very still.

"How long has he been holding that over you?"

"Eight months."

He stood up from the desk.

Walked to the window.

Stood with his back to me for a moment, looking out at the city.

Then he turned around.

"There is no version of that accusation," he said, "that I would not personally dismantle in public, in front of every person in this city who matters, before it had time to touch you." His voice was completely steady.

"He chose the wrong threat."

My phone lit up again.

This time it was a text from Andrew.

*I know where you are.

We'll talk in the morning.

Don't do anything you'll regret.*

I showed it to Ethan without a word.

He read it.

Handed the phone back.

"Screenshot that," he said.