Page 48 of Ivory Legacy

I bit back a sigh, turning to recalibrate the spectrometer. The precision required for the task usually soothed me, but today it was just another source of frustration. Despite the layers of protective gear separating us, I could feel the distance between Ellie and me more acutely than ever. It was like trying to bridge a gap with a frayed thread.

“Hey,” I tried again after a stretch of strained quiet, “how about coffee later? My treat.” I forced a casualness into my tone I didn’t quite feel.

Ellie glanced up, the surprise evident in the slight raise of her eyebrows. “Coffee?”

“Yeah,” I persisted, pushing past the tightness in my chest. “There’s a new place that opened up by the lab—heard their espresso is top-notch. We could use a break, don’t you think?”

She hesitated, weighing my words, then offered a nod that held more resignation than warmth. “Sure, Jade. Coffee sounds good.”

“Great.” The relief was genuine, even if the smile I mustered felt brittle. “It’s a date.”

A few hours later, we wrapped up our tasks with mechanical efficiency, the energy in the room shifting from tense to tentative. As we shed our lab coats, the weight of unspoken apologies hung heavy in the air.

Exiting BioHQ, the blast of winter chilled my skin, but the prospect of mending fences with Ellie warmed something within me. I tucked my hands into my coat pockets, turned my face against the biting wind, and led the way towards the promise of caffeine and conversation.

The clink of porcelain mugs on the wooden tabletop punctuated the silence that had settled between us. The steam from our coffees curled up, disappearing into the crisp air of the cozy cafe.

“Ellie,” I began, my voice a little more than a murmur as I wrapped my fingers around the warmth of my cup. “I’m sorry. For everything. For not being there when you needed me.” My words tumbled out, rushed and sincere.

She bit her lip, a gesture I knew meant she was wrestling with her thoughts. Finally, she looked up from her own coffee, her brown eyes clouded. “Jade, I... I’ve felt lost. You ghosting me, it hurt more than I expected.”

My heart sank. The distance between us had been my doing, fear and uncertainty driving me to pull away from one of the few anchors I had in this storm of life. Ellie’s friendship was a lifeline, and I had nearly severed it with my silence.

“Ellie, I never meant to...” I started, but she lifted a hand, stopping me mid-apology.

“Look, I know that things were complicated. But you could have talked to me. Like how you talked to me at the clinic.”

“I didn’t want to put you in a position like that again.”

“So you ran?” she asked. “You didn’t even tell me that you were going to run.”

“Well, yeah…”

She picked her head up to look at me, and for the first time, I noticed that there were tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry, Jade. Truly.”

“There’s nothing for you to be sorry for.”

Ellie’s eyes were brimming with tears, spilling over and tracing silent paths down her cheeks. “Yes, there is,” she said. “Jade, there’s something I need to tell you. And I’m going to ask you to sit here and wait for me to finish what I need to say before you react. Just…give me five minutes, okay?”

I nodded, the throat at the pit of my stomach tightening. “Yeah,” I said. “Yeah, okay.”

Chapter Twenty-Three: Dante

The door to Enzo’s study clicked shut behind me, sealing off the brisk chill of the early evening. Marco, perched on one of the chairs, a leg dangling carelessly over the armrest, was the first to catch my eye. He offered a half-hearted smirk, but I barely registered it. My thoughts were a whirlwind, all centering around Jade—her smile, her strength, the child she carried that was half mine.

The fact that she hadn’t given me an answer.

The fact that she hadn’t reached out to me.

“Sit down, Dante,” Enzo’s voice sliced through my preoccupation like a knife through silk. It wasn’t a request; it was an order. The old man sat behind his desk, his face set in that familiar stern mask that spelled out business—and not the kind we declared on our taxes.

I didn’t sit. Not yet. Instead, I studied him for a moment, trying to read the lines etched into his weathered face. Maybe I was looking for a hint of softness, some fatherly concern that mirrored my own fears for the future. But if it was there, it was buried deep beneath years of ruthlessness and command.

“Fine,” I muttered and finally took a seat across from him, feeling the leather of the chair grip my suit pants. Marco quit his fidgeting, sensing the shift in the room’s atmosphere. We were about to dive into deep waters, and nobody wanted to be the one who couldn’t swim.

“I called you here to talk about the RICO case. The FBI and the NYPD are circling us like vultures. What are we doing about it?”

I couldn’t sit still. The words “RICO case” fell from Enzo’s lips, and I was on my feet again, pacing the room like a caged animal. My father’s study suddenly felt too small, the walls inching closer with every sentence he spoke about wiretaps, laundered money, and potential sentences.

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