Billionaire, I Am Not Your Wife! novel Chapter 192

Scouting Sedona-2

I straightened up. I didn’t wipe my face yet. Some instinct said: *let her see what you look like after four sets.*

“Sedona.” Dante arrived first, fell into step beside me without making it a big deal as he showed up, as always, being present. Just there. “You played well.”

“I played a tie.”

“Against a ranked player, two months post-treatment, with zero competitive practice in eleven years.” He glanced at me sideways. “I’ll take the tie.”

Maria reached us. She extended her hand, and I shook it-firm, brief, professional.

“You know,” she said, “when Dante first told me about you, I thought I remembered the name. I went back through junior circuit records. Regional champion at fifteen, finalist at sixteen, circuit records for three seasons before you disappeared.” She had a directness that wasn’t unkind, just undecorated. “I couldn’t understand it. Players with your trajectory don’t just disappear. I assumed injury.”

“Something like that,” I said.

She looked at me for a moment. Let it sit. “Dante also told me about the cancer.”

Something tightened in my chest. Not defensiveness exactly-more like the instinct to brace for a *but*. For the *however*. The thing that came after the compliment and undid it because my history greatly conflicted with what they wanted and expected of me and nobody was willing to take a gamble on a cancer patient that might fail their hands.

‘It’s been two months since you completed treatment,” she said. “And you just played four competitive sets against a ranked player and you’re standing here talking to me.”

“Is that a problem?”

I thought about Logan. About the custody case. About the deliberate, careful way I’d been keeping my Tennis return out of every conversation that might route back to Chicago.

“No,” I said. “I know.”

Maria extended her hand again. “Congratulations, Sedona. I’ll be in touch with paperwork by end of week.”

We shook. She nodded at Dante-some wordless exchange between two people who’d known each other a long time-and then she walked back toward the entrance, already looking at her tablet.