Page 10 of The Breakup Broker

Which one?

The response came instantly.

Client #343

Right side.

Marcus caught my eye from behind the counter. My favorite barista raised an eyebrow in our usual silent code.Need backup?

I shook my head. Marcus had witnessed enough of my “meetings” to read the signs. The sharp click of my heels against hardwood sounded like a countdown to detonation.

The mark’s broad shoulders filled his suit with the practiced ease of old money. Something about how he held himself tugged at my memory—a ghost of familiarity that sent an unwelcome shiver down my spine. His fingers drummed against the coffee cup in a rhythm I knew too well. But that was impossible. He was just another client, another navy suit in a city full of them.

I approached, hating this new angle, this loss of control. “I’m so sorry I’m late. The train was?—”

He turned, and my practiced script died in my throat. Kingston-blue eyes met mine—and the color drained from our faces. Five years vanished between one heartbeat and the next, leaving me dizzy with the force of remembering. The familiar scent of his cologne slammed into me, yanking me straight back in time.

My legs wobbled as I lowered myself into what should have been my power seat. Every layer of armor I’d painstakingly built buckled under the sheer force of his presence. This was all wrong. I wasn’t Savvy Honeysucker right now—I was the breakup broker, the queen of clean exits.

But staring at him, it seemed like that polished persona was slipping away. I wasn’t the confident professional I’d trained myself to be. I was twenty-two again, back in River Bend, letting Henry Kingston trace constellations on my skin while the Hudson lapped against the dock. I couldn’t be that girl again. Not here. Not now. The familiar scent of his cologne, unchanged from those summers, hit me like a freight train. My stomach twisted, and I gripped the edge of the table to keep from bolting.

Henry had been the center of every dream I’d let myself believe in back then. He was the boy who’d kissed me on the dock at sunset and whispered promises of forever while fireflies danced around us. And he was the one who’d left me to piece together the ruins of those dreams alone.

“Savvy?” His voice was rough, incredulous. The coffee cup clattered against its saucer, dark liquid sloshing dangerously close to the rim. “What in the ... how are you...?”

Hearing my name in his voice hit like the distant rumble of a storm you thought had moved on. His gaze lingered on the freckles on my collarbone—freckles he used to trace with his fingertips under the dim glow of string lights on my parents’ porch. No. I couldn’t let my mind wander there.

“Your girlfriend,” I managed, my voice sounding distant even to my own ears. “She hired me.”

The words hung between us like a live wire.

I forced my hands to stay steady as I placed my phone face-down on the table, buying precious seconds to compose myself. I never had to look at client messages during meetings. Never. But seeing Henry sitting there, those eyes watching my every move, had scattered my usually perfect recall.

Just read it. Get through it. End it.

With fingers that shook, I picked upmy phone and pulled up the message, the bright screen swimming before my eyes. “She said, and I quote—” My voice cracked. I cleared my throat and started again. “I refuse to enter a union based on my monetary worth. I deserve more than a marriage built on bank statements and business mergers. I want—” Another breath. “I want to marry for love, not to expand family empires or satisfy parental expectations. I want someone who sees me as more than a corporate asset.”

The words were like glass in my mouth, each cutting deeper than the last. But what twisted the knife wasn’t the message—it was Henry’s response.

I expected anger. Expected hurt. Expected anything but the long exhale that escaped him, his shoulders dropping as if a burden had just been lifted. Relief. Pure, unmistakable relief flooded his features.

He adjusted in his seat, and something slipped from his pocket—a velvet box tumbled to the floor, its dark surface collecting coffee shop dust.

My gaze dropped to the box. Everything I’d dreamed about in my early twenties lay inside that box, everything I’d imagined on those endless summer nights when we’d talk about forever.

I looked back at Henry, tears burning behind my eyes. “You came here to propose?” My voice cracked on the last word. “And she’s refusing to marry you.”

Something dangerously close to satisfaction twisted through the hurt in my chest. Karma had a cruel sense of humor. Here was Henry Kingston, finally ready to commit, holding out the dream I’d once desperately wanted—only to face the very thing he’d given me—rejection.

His relief vanished. He leaned forward, one hand reaching across the table. “Savvy, it’s not what?—”

“Don’t.” The word came out harder than I intended.Professional. Distant. The tone I reserved for clients trying to negotiate. “You disappeared without a word. You have no right to explain. Not now.”

“Please, if you’d just listen?—”

“I was willing to listen for years, but that time has passed. You aren’t even upset that she’s dumping you. You’re still the same Henry, the one who could walk away without emotion.”

I shoved my phone back into my purse, needing something to do with my hands.

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