Page 9 of Ruin Me Gently

The one who’d shown up at work just to bring me coffee because he knew I was exhausted.

The one who’d pull me in closer in his sleep, tucking me against him, making sure I was warm.

It hadn’t all been bad. That was the hardest part. The mostdangerouspart.

Because it meant Icouldn’tjust write him off as a monster.

It meant I had to accept that maybe he’d reallytried.That maybe he’d meant all of it. The goodandthe bad.

Maybe I really didwantto love him one day.

And wasn’t that what love was supposed to be? Sticking through the bad? Choosingto see past the sharp edges to hold onto the good? Onto potential?

That’s what people did when they cared, right?

They forgave. They gave second chances. They tried.

One last chance.

One last damn chance.

And if he ruined it? Then I was done.

CHAPTER FOUR

The ballroom sparkled underthe chandeliers, the air thick with perfume, champagne, and the subtlescent of performative altruism.

Glass flutes gleamed in manicured hands, silk gowns flowing against polished marble, and the men—well, they were measuring their worth by the weight of their wallets and the number of people desperate to shake their hands.

It was polished. Sophisticated. Exactly the way it was supposed to be.

The Fourth Annual Graves & Everly Technologies Charity Gala for Poverty Relief.

A fucking mouthful. One that barely fit on the invitations, but trying to change it wasn’t worth the bureaucratic headache.

The venue dripped with wealth, but that wasn’t why we were here. The city didn’t need another overpriced event where the rich clinked glasses and patted themselves on the back for remembering that poor people existed. It had enough of those.

What it needed was real help. That’s why we did this.

Yes, I’d worked my ass off for years, clawing my way out of nothing to build what I had today, brick by metaphorical brick. But a lot of it had come down to luck. Right places, right times, crossing paths with the right people who could open the right doors. That wasn’t talent alone. That was chance.

Not everyone got those chances. And seriously, what’s the point of sitting on millions of dollars when you know there are people out there sitting on absolutely nothing? If we couldn’t do something meaningful with all this, what the hell were we even doing?

The gala funded local food banks, shelters, affordable housing projects—direct investments into the heart of the city that had let us grow.

The evening had been a haze of handshakes, forced smiles, the same polished small talk I’d cycled through a hundred times before. Some conversations mattered—people who actually gave a shit, who understood what we were doing here. The rest?Just a parade of designer suits and empty platitudes, all nodding along like they weren’t mentally tallying how many likes their outfit was going to get the second they posted it.

Did it piss me off? Maybe a little.

But money was money. If their self-serving guilt funded another shelter, another stocked food bank, another night where someone didn’t have to sleep on the damn street, then fine. Let them use this as their good deed for the year. I wasn’t in the business of purity tests. I was in the business of results.

The whole thing played out in the same predictable rhythm. Grateful patrons thanking me like I’d personally rebuilt the city. Investors poking around for details on the company’s profit margins, like I was about to hand over my ledger in the middle of a gala. Newcomers blinking wide-eyed at the whole thing, sipping their champagne as someone gently steered them toward writing a check they’d barely understand.

Smiles. Nods. The same recycled praise in fifty different flavours.

‘Such important work you’re doing.’

‘You must feel so proud.’

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