You and Jake had never asked for each other. Your marriage was nothing more than a transaction, your father wanted a merger, his father wanted influence, and neither cared enough to ask what their children wanted. You resented Jake for being part of the deal, a stranger forced into your life. And Jake resented you just as much, not because of who you were, but because your marriage was a reminder of how little his father valued his feelings.

One quiet afternoon, you sat in the living room flipping through a magazine, trying to distract yourself from the tense atmosphere that always lingered in the mansion. The sound of footsteps on the stairs made you look up. Jake was coming down, dressed in an exquisite suit, black, sharp, tailored perfectly to him.

He didn’t glance your way at first, adjusting his cufflinks with practiced calm. But when his eyes finally met yours, something unreadable flickered there, annoyance, obligation, maybe even curiosity, before he looked away again, as if the two of you were nothing more than business partners passing through the same house.