Free Web NovelChapter 347: Are You Sick?
Two weeks after the wedding, life had settled back into its familiar rhythms.
Gilbert and Audrey were two weeks into their honeymoon, somewhere warm and coastal, sending photographs of sunsets and elaborate meals. Audrey had texted Arianne three days ago with a picture of Gilbert attempting to snorkel, his expression somewhere between determination and terror. He says he’s enjoying himself, Audrey had written. I’ve chosen to believe him.
Franz had returned to filming the day after the ceremony. The production had moved to a location closer to Montclair—close enough that he could drive home every night, though the commute was two hours each way. He made it without complaint. He would arrive after the twins were asleep, sometimes after Arianne was asleep, and slide into bed beside her in the dark. In the mornings, he was gone before any of them woke, a fresh cup of coffee cooling on the kitchen counter, a note in his careful handwriting: Didn’t want to wake you. Call me when you can.
They hadn’t had a honeymoon. Franz had mentioned it briefly, a passing comment wrapped in a joke. "We should demand a refund. We never got the tropical vacation package. I was promised a honeymoon." Arianne had told him they could take one later, when filming wrapped, when the quarter ended, when there was time. There was always something to wait for.
The twins had adapted to the new routine. Arianne dropped them at school in the mornings. Julian picked them up in the afternoons along with Kyle, the three children crammed into the backseat of his car, Lily narrating the day’s events, Leo typing his contributions, Kyle asking questions about everything. The calendar on the refrigerator had a new color-coding system—blue for Arianne’s drop-offs, green for Julian’s pickups, purple for the weekends with Vincent and Amanda. Lily had explained the system to Franz during one of his late returns, and he had nodded seriously and told her it was the most efficient calendar he’d ever seen.
At Rochefort Group, the new quarter had begun with its usual demands. The inventory assessments from all subsidiaries had arrived in a tidal wave of spreadsheets and reports, each one requiring review and approval. The quarterly projections needed updating. The annual summaries for the previous fiscal year were yet to be finalized. Arianne had been working long hours for weeks, and she had told herself that the fatigue was nothing more than the natural consequence of a heavy workload.
Gio noticed before she did.
It was mid-morning when he first brought it up. He was standing at her desk, tablet in hand, reviewing the schedule for the week. Arianne was staring at a report she’d been reading for ten minutes without turning the page.
"The quarterly trip abroad is in two weeks," Gio said. "Braniff and Miss Miranda are both expecting you. I’ve drafted the itinerary."
Arianne didn’t respond immediately. Her eyes were on the report, but her focus was somewhere else entirely.
"Arianne."
She looked up. "Yes. The trip. Send me the itinerary."
"I already did. Three days ago. You haven’t opened it."
She blinked. Glanced at her laptop screen as if seeing it for the first time. "I’ve been busy with the inventory reports."
"I know." Gio set his tablet down. "Are you sick?"
"No. I’m fine. It’s just the long hours. The subsidiary reports were extensive this quarter. I haven’t had enough time to rest." She picked up her pen, a gesture of dismissal. "It’ll pass."
Gio didn’t move. "Should I cancel the trip?"
Arianne opened her mouth to say no. The word was automatic, the way it always was when someone suggested she couldn’t handle her workload, but something stopped her. A hesitation that was so brief, so subtle, that anyone else would have missed it.
Gio didn’t miss it.
"Delay it," she said finally. "By a month. I’ll reassess then."
"All right." He made a note on his tablet. His expression was neutral, but his eyes stayed on her for a moment longer than necessary. "I’ll inform Braniff and Miss Miranda that the trip has been postponed."
"Thank you." freewēbnoveℓ.com
He left her office without further comment, but he was watching her now.
The days that followed were a blur of reports and meetings and the grinding work of keeping a company running. Arianne arrived early and left late, the way she always did during the start of a new quarter. She answered emails, signed contracts, attended the meetings Gio scheduled, and made the decisions that needed to be made.
Something was off. She couldn’t focus the way she usually did. Her attention drifted during presentations. She found herself staring at spreadsheets without absorbing the numbers. She was tired—not the ordinary tiredness that came from long hours, but something deeper. Something that settled into her bones and refused to leave.
She told herself it was nothing. She told herself she just needed a weekend to rest. The twins were with Vincent and Amanda on Saturdays now, and she had time to herself. She should have been fine.
She wasn’t fine.
Late afternoon, three days after Gio first asked if she was sick. The office had emptied, the building clearing out as employees headed home. Arianne had finished the contracts that needed her signature an hour ago, but she hadn’t left yet. She was on the couch against the wall, her head resting against the cushion, her eyes closed.
The door opened. She didn’t hear it.
Gio stood in the doorway. He’d come to collect the finished contracts from her desk, but his attention went immediately to the couch. To her. She was asleep—or at least she appeared to be. Her face was pale, the lines of exhaustion etched around her eyes. Her breathing was shallow.
This wasn’t like her. Arianne didn’t sleep during work hours. She didn’t rest until the work was done. Even during the busiest quarters, even during the worst of the investigation, even during the weeks when Franz was away and the twins were demanding and the weight of everything pressed down on her all at once, she had never simply stopped.
Gio had been thinking about this since before the wedding. She hadn’t been herself for weeks. He’d assumed it was stress, the investigation, the new quarter, the endless demands on her attention, but Arianne knew her limits. She had always been careful about that. She never pushed herself to the point of collapse.
Until now.
"Arianne."
She didn’t respond. He stepped closer.
"Arianne. The meeting with the legal department is in half an hour."
Her eyes opened. She looked at him, and for a moment her gaze was dazed, unfocused, as if she couldn’t quite place where she was. Then she blinked, and the fog cleared, and she was Arianne again.
"The legal department. Yes." She pressed her palms against the couch cushion and pushed herself upright. "I’m coming."
She stood.
Her eyes rolled back.
Gio moved before he could think. He lunged forward and caught her as her body went slack, his arms wrapping around her, his own body taking the brunt of the impact as they went down. His shoulder hit the edge of the coffee table, pain shooting through his arm, but he held onto her. She was dead weight in his arms, her head lolling against his shoulder, her face ashen.
"Arianne." He lowered her to the floor, cradling her head, his hand patting her cheek. "Arianne. Wake up."
She didn’t respond.
"Arianne!"
Nothing. Her breathing was shallow but present. Her pulse was weak but steady under his fingers. She was alive. She was unconscious, but she was alive.
The contracts were scattered across the floor around them, pages of signatures and approvals and the endless machinery of a company that suddenly meant nothing at all. Gio’s hand was shaking as he reached for his phone.
He called emergency services of the Rochefort Group first. Gave the floor and the room location. His voice was steady, the voice he used when something terrible was happening and he needed to be useful. The dispatcher asked him questions. He answered them without thinking.
Then he hung up and called Franz.
The phone rang three times before he answered.
Franz picked up. "Gio? What’s—"
"It’s Arianne. She collapsed. She’s unconscious. The ambulance is on the way."
The silence on the other end of the line was absolute.
"I’m coming," Franz said. His voice was different now, stripped of every pretense, every layer of composure. "Tell me where. Tell me what happened. Tell me she’s—"
"She’s breathing. She’s alive. Just come."
"I’m on my way."
The line went dead. Gio lowered the phone and looked at his sister, unconscious on the floor of her office, her dark hair spread across the carpet, her face pale and motionless. He had seen her survive betrayal and exile and the collapse of everything she’d built. He had seen her fight five men outside a club without flinching. He had seen her stand at a lectern and tell the world she was coming for whoever had tried to destroy her.
He had never seen her like this.
He held her hand and waited for the ambulance to arrive.
