Page 141 of King of Envy

Jordan swallowed. “I’m saying, I want to call off our arrangement.”

The breath expelled in one huge rush, leaving me lightheaded.

“I’m sorry for leaving you in the lurch like this.” His eyes pled with mine. “I’ll still pay you for your time. We never got married, but you spent the past eighteen months pretending to be my fiancée. That’s worth something. It won’t be five million—I don’t have that much liquidity to spare—but it’ll be at least one mil. I hope that’s?—”

“Jordan.” I placed a hand on his shoulder, stopping him mid-ramble. My heart pounded so hard I half expected it to burst out of my chest and perform a happy jig right there in the middle of the hospital. “Stop. I’m not mad at you, and you don’t owe me anything. In fact, I…well, I was going to tell you that I wanted to end the arrangement too.”

His mouth parted. “Seriously?”

I nodded.

“Fuck.” He dropped back against his pillow. “I should’ve let you go first and saved myself that speech. I…” Another cough interrupted him mid-sentence. “I need some water after all that.”

A giggle climbed up my throat. I tried to tamp it down, but once it was on the move, there was no stopping it. It spilled out in a burst of laughter, and after a shocked beat, Jordan started laughing too.

I doubled over, tears of mirth blurring my vision. Jordan’s shoulders shook so hard his bed squeaked. The room reverberated with the sounds of our relief as the dark cloud over my head finally evaporated.

Other problems like Beaumont and the Brotherhood lurked at the fringes, but I allowed myself to enjoy this moment for now.

When our laughter finally faded, I brought Jordan a bottle of water from the room’s mini fridge and tried to sort through our next steps. I wasn’t too worried about announcing our “split.” The wedding attack gave us a springboard for breaking up, and Sloane and the Fords’ PR team could iron out the finer details.

I was more worried about the tangible consequences for Jordan. “What’ll happen to your inheritance?” I asked.

Uncertainty swallowed the remainder of his humor. “I don’t know, but I almost died, Ayana. That really makes a man reevaluate his priorities. When the bullet hit me—before I lost consciousness—I wasn’t thinking about money. I was thinking about the life I’d lived and the regrets I had. I would’ve died without telling my family the truth. That was my biggest regret of all.” Jordan’s mouth thinned. “My grandmother’s not doing well. I mean, she hasn’t been for a while, but hopefully our breakup doesn’t send her to an even earlier grave.”

I reached down and squeezed his hand again. I wished I could do more to help, but this was Jordan’s fight. He had to face it on his own.

“She values honesty, so there’s that. But I don’t know how she’ll react to the…revelation about me or our previous arrangement.” He blew out a sigh. “I guess the worst that can happen is she disinherits me, which isn’t as bad as dying. Losing the company would hurt more than the money, but at least I wouldn’t have to hide who I really am anymore.”

“Don’t count her out yet. Your grandmother is a reasonable person. She might surprise you,” I said. Orla Ford was a lot of things, but close-minded wasn’t one of them.

“Maybe.” Jordan fixed me with a shrewd stare. “What about you? What’s your reason for wanting to end the arrangement?”

“Um, well…” He wouldn’t care that Vuk and I got together, but it seemed tacky to tell him we’d been fooling around while he’d been lying here unconscious.

“It’s Vuk, isn’t it?”

For someone who’d woken up from a week-long coma just hours ago, he was surprisingly observant.

I supposed he already knew Vuk had feelings for me since Vuk had asked him to call off the wedding, but he didn’t know if those feelings were reciprocated—until now.

“Yes,” I admitted. “He told me about your argument before the ceremony, and he was in D.C. with me. He left this morning for a work emergency, but we…I mean…”

“It’s okay,” Jordan said. “You don’t have to tell me. I know. I see it written all over your face.”

“I’m sorry,” I said miserably. “Even if you and I weren’t truly dating, it was wrong of us to carry on behind your back. It happened once before the ceremony. In the beginning of October. And also…this weekend. Before we officially ended our arrangement.” Flags of shame scorched my cheekbones.

“I don’t need to know the details, but we did say affairs were allowed in our marriage as long as they were discreet,” Jordan conceded, his tone dry. “What happened between you two was just an iteration of that. I admit, it would’ve been a little weird for you to get with a close friend—it makes things messier—but I’m not angry at either of you for what you did. I’m more upset that you didn’t tell me earlier.” He shook his head. “Then again, I kept my doubts to myself too, so I guess we both had our secrets.”

“I guess we did.” I smiled sadly. We’d wasted so much time when we should’ve been honest from the start, but some things were only clear in hindsight. “Hopefully, that’s all behind us now.”

“Hopefully.” Jordan’s energy was flagging. His eyes drooped, and his breaths turned shallow. This was a lot to put him through so soon after regaining consciousness, but he waved me off when I tried to get him to lie down again. “About Vuk. He’s not perfect, but when he cares about someone—trulycares about them—he’ll go to the ends of the earth for them. Remember that the next time he pisses you off because that’s sure to happen.”

Fresh laughter bubbled in my throat. “Oh, I know. Trust me.” I glanced at my phone. No new texts or calls yet. “Does he know you’re awake?”

“Who knows? My mother said she called him, but it went straight to voicemail. That bastard.” Jordan sighed. “I return from the dead and he doesn’t even have the courtesy to greet me with a ‘welcome back’ balloon.”

“If it makes you feel better, he’s more the type to bring a handle of vodka.”

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