Billionaire, I Am Not Your Wife! novel Chapter 213

Chapter 208: You are Ready

SEDONA POV

“He doesn’t know you’re playing again.”

“No.”

The silence this time had a different quality-the quality Cameron had when he was calculating something with variables he didn’t love.

“Nick watches tennis,” he said. “Catherine is in the circuit. It’s a reasonable assumption that tennis is on in that household.”

I had thought about this already. I had thought about it at length, turning it over, looking at all the angles. Nick, who did not know his mother had ever been a competitive player. Nick, who might look at a television screen in late December and see a face he knew attached to a name he recognized next to a sport he’d been watching because Catherine Voss was in his living room.

“I know,” I said.

“Do you want to get ahead of it?” he said. “Tell Nick before the announcement?”

“I’m thinking about that.” I looked at the window. The garden, the Japanese maple, the November light lying flat and silver across the grass. “I don’t want him to find out from a screen. But I also don’t-the custody case is in play. His calls to me are still happening without Logan knowing. If I call him and tell him something this significant, there’s a risk it gets back to Logan before I’ve had a chance to-”

“Manage the information,” Cameron said.

“Have the conversation I want to have,” I corrected. “On my terms. Not as a reaction to something Logan has already decided to use against me.”

Cameron was quiet. I could hear him thinking-the texture of it, the specific silence of my brother doing the thing he did best.

“Adaeze will have a view on this,” he said. “Call her this afternoon when you confirm the phone

appointment. Ask her specifically what the optics are of Nick learning about the tennis through you versus through a broadcast.”

“Yes.”

“And separately.” He paused. “Logan is going to find out you’re in Chicago regardless. The hearing is a matter of public record once it’s filed. He already knows about the custody case. The tennis is-that’s a layer he doesn’t have yet, but it’s coming in the next few days whether you control it or not.”

“I know.”

“So the question is what posture we take when he has all the information.” He said it evenly-not alarming, just accurate. “Because he’s going to have it soon.”

13

You Are Reser.

Claim

4thought about Logan in Chicago. Logan in his apartment, or his office, or wherever he was when his phone rang or his television was on and the competitor list came across the screen. Logan seeing *Sedona Preston* in the field-not Hayes, Preston, my real name, the name Maria had registered me under because that was who was now-and the photograph they’d used, which was from the facility, me on the court, mid-form, looking exactly like what I was.

I thought about what he would do with that.

I thought about the operative, and the garden, and Dante’s arm around me in the moment before everything unraveled. I thought about the stalking complaint on official record. I thought about Cameron’s video.

“He’s already going to be in a difficult position at the hearing, I said. “The stalking complaint is on record. Adaeze said his lawyer has been aggressive but the documentation is solid.”

“Yes,” Cameron said.

“The tennis is-it’s actually good for the case,” I said, working through it. “It shows changed circumstances. Remission, physical recovery, active competition. It supports the argument that I’m not the person Logan’s lawyers are going to try to paint me as.”

“It does,” Cameron said. “Adaeze will make that argument. But Logan’s lawyer will also try to use it-they’ll say the competition schedule is evidence that you’re not in a position to give Nick stable, consistent parenting. You’ll be traveling. You’ll have training commitments.”

“So will Catherine,” I said. “She’s on the circuit. She’s in that same household.”

A pause.

“Make sure Adaeze has that,” Cameron said. “Word for word. The exact same argument applied to Catherine Voss, who is currently living in Logan’s home and is the person his lawyer will be trying to position as the stable maternal figure.”

I wrote it down. I had a notebook now, specifically for the case-a thing Lucian had suggested, and which had become indispensable, because the number of details that needed tracking had grown beyond what I could hold in my head reliably.

“Cameron,” I said.

“Yes.”

“I’m going to see Nick.” I said it quietly. Not as strategy, not as logistics. Just the fact of it. “I’m going to be in Chicago and Nick is in Chicago and it’s Christmas and-”

“You’re going to see him,” Cameron said. His voice had changed-the strategy layer had stepped back, the brother layer came forward. “We’ll make sure of it.”

I pressed my fingers against my eyes briefly. Breathed. “He wants to see me. He said so. He told me about the Catherine match, the invitational-”

“Which is also in Chicago in January,” Cameron said.

“Which is also in Chicago.” I lowered my hand. “He’s going to be at Catherine’s match in January and I’m going to be competing in the same city starting December twenty-eighth.” I let that sit for a moment. “He’s

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< You Are Ready-

going to be in the crowd watching Catherine and he’s going to-”

“See you in the field,” Cameron said.

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