Page 33 of My CEO Neighbor
"Okay.Get some rest, then.Tomorrow's a big day."
Tomorrow was a big day.The day that would determine CloudSync's future, Ted's future, everything he'd sacrificed the past three years to achieve.
So why did it feel less important than figuring out how to fix whatever he'd just broken with Monica?
Ted stripped off his clothes and headed for the shower, hoping hot water might wash away the scent of Monica's skin and the memory of how she'd felt moving against him.But even under the scalding spray, he could still taste her, still feel the phantom weight of her body against his.
Still see the hurt in her eyes when he'd dismissed her like a temporary distraction.
Ted finished his shower and dressed in fresh clothes, then sat down at his laptop to review his presentation.The slides loaded automatically, familiar charts and graphs filling his screen with projections and market analysis and all the data that was supposed to prove CloudSync's worth.
But instead of seeing revenue potential, all Ted could think about was Monica's voice in the darkness, asking him what he'd measure success by if not his father's metrics.All he could see was her face when she'd told him he was worthy just for existing, not for what he'd accomplished or how much money he made.
All he could remember was the way she'd kissed him—like he was enough, exactly as he was.
Ted worked until midnight, polishing slides and rehearsing presentations, but his heart wasn't in it.Every few minutes, he found himself listening for sounds from Monica's apartment, wondering what she was doing, whether she was thinking about him at all.
Whether she was regretting what they'd shared as much as he was regretting how he'd handled it.
Probably not.She was probably relieved to be free of the complicated corporate asshole who'd used her for stress relief and then retreated into professional mode the moment reality intruded.Who'd taken a beautiful moment and made it feel dirty with his cutting dismissal.
And maybe that was for the best.Maybe they really were too different, wanted too different things.Maybe what had happened in the elevator was just circumstance and proximity and the strange intimacy of shared crisis.
But even as Ted tried to convince himself of that, he knew it was bullshit.What they'd shared had been real—the most real thing he'd experienced in years.And he'd destroyed it because he was too much of a coward to handle something that couldn't be managed with spreadsheets and strategic planning.
Tomorrow, he'd get dressed in another expensive suit and pitch his company to investors who measured human worth in quarterly returns, and pretend that none of it mattered.
Pretend that he hadn't just discovered what it felt like to be truly known by another person.
Pretend that he hadn't just thrown it all away for a fucking spreadsheet.
The worst part was that he'd seen it happening, had watched himself build walls between them with each cutting word, and hadn't been able to stop.Had known he was hurting her and done it anyway, because professional distance was easier than admitting he'd never felt anything like what she made him feel.
Because admitting that would mean risking everything, and Ted had spent three years learning that the only thing worse than being alone was losing what really mattered.
So he'd made sure it didn't matter, had reduced the most meaningful connection of his life to a temporary lapse in judgment.
And now he'd have to live with the knowledge that he'd had something real and beautiful in his hands, and he'd crushed it rather than risk being vulnerable enough to keep it.
