Page 51 of The Sexy Ex's Brother
Ari sends another update just before midnight:Zurich account accessed again. Someone moved the funds. Not Derek. Possibly Ivy. Or someone working with her.
I sit back in the car, jaw clenched, staring at the skyline. She’s out there. Not hiding. Working. Fighting. Every breath I take feels like I’m borrowing time until I see her again. The thought steadies me. For a moment.
Then I remember what Marcus said when he sent me Daniel Dawson’s file:If Rosenthal brought him in, it means she thinks someone might not make it out of this clean.
My hand curls tight around the leather armrest, the city lights reflecting off the window like sparks waiting to ignite. The tension burrows deep in my spine.
I scroll to the photo again, Dawson’s grainy silhouette stepping out of the Brooklyn townhouse. He wasn’t looking around. He didn’t have to. That kind of calm only comes from knowing someone’s already watching your six. And that terrifies me more than anything. Because Ivy’s smart enough to align with people like that now. Which means she doesn’t need me to save her. But she might still need me to shield her from what comes next.
I lean my head back, eyes burning, throat tight. Maybe I waited too long. Maybe in protecting her from the truth, I gave Derek the room to weaponize it. Maybe I’ve already lost her, not to distance, but to the fight I should’ve joined sooner.
My phone buzzes again. It’s Ari:Unknown IP traced to a private terminal in Tribeca. High probability Ivy’s team is using it as a jump point. We’re close.
Close isn’t good enough.
I type back fast:Scramble the backup protocols. Ghost every mirror. If we’re being watched, we go dark.
And then I do the one thing I haven’t let myself do since she left. I say her name out loud.
“Ivy. Hold on.”
Because I’m coming. Even if it breaks me.
27
IVY
The townhouse is quieter than usual. Dawson insists that’s a good thing. “Quiet means the world hasn’t caught up to you yet,” he said this morning, handing me coffee and a burner phone I haven’t touched. The brew Dawson handed me wasn’t bad, strong enough to clear my head, steady enough to feel like a decision made right. I took it as a sign.
Now, I sit at the long, scarred dining table with Sienna across from me and Dawson at the head. The light filtering through the blinds slices the room into strips, of shadow, of promise, of something like tension disguised as hope.
Sienna’s typing on her phone, fast and sharp. “Okay. I’ve got two PR contacts and one old college roommate who works in compliance at the SEC. She still owes me a favor.”
Dawson lifts an eyebrow. “You run a tight operation.”
“She runs a grudge ledger,” I say dryly. “But today, we’re on the same side.”
Sienna doesn’t look up. “Today, we burn things for sport.”
We’re working on a coordinated drop, a controlled leak of the documentation Talia agreed to run with after Dawson made the first contact, bolstered by the new evidence Dawson uncoveredfrom Rosenthal’s files. It’s not enough to expose Derek. We have to disarm him. Cripple his channels, disable his influence, break the machinery before it can spin again.
“We’ve timed the press wave,” Dawson says, laying out a folder. “First, financial misconduct. Then personal threats. Finally, leaked audio.”
He slides me a small flash drive. I don’t ask what’s on it. I already know. Derek, mid-threat, mid-smirk. The way he said it like he’d already won. I can still hear his voice in my head—measured, cruel, confident. “She’s too soft to fight. She’ll fold. They always do.”
“Ivy,” Dawson says carefully, “you don’t have to stay through the release. We can move you before it hits.”
I shake my head. “I’m not leaving until this is done. If Jack taught me anything, it’s that silence doesn’t keep you safe. It just delays the wreckage.”
Sienna exhales, her fingers stilled for the first time all day. “You’ve changed, you know. You used to fold the moment people got loud.”
“I used to think surviving meant pleasing everyone,” I say. “Now I know it means protecting the ones who matter, even from themselves.”
Dawson checks his watch. “We drop in four hours.”
I nod, heart steady. But my thoughts drift, back to Jack. To his hands on my waist, steady and strong. The way he looked at me like I wasn’t broken, like I’d never even cracked. The way his voice roughened when he said my name, like it cost him something every time. I wonder if he’s reading my note again. I didn’t say much, just enough. Enough to give him hope. Enough to say goodbye without using the word. Enough to remind him I love him, even if I couldn’t stay. But I miss him. God, I miss him. I press my fingers against the edge of the table, grounding myself. I keep thinking of the last moment we shared, his thumbbrushing my jaw, his forehead pressed to mine. It felt like the world held its breath. And I’ve been holding mine ever since.
“Ivy,” Dawson says, pulling me back. “There’s one thing we haven’t accounted for.”
