Page 29 of Thirty-Two Calls

The interview was broadcast live. The studio was sleek, modern, and intimidating. Across from Lance sat Joe Marshall, a seasoned, sharp-minded journalist.

For the first thirty minutes, the interview proceeded flawlessly. Lance was the apex predator, dismantling questions about liquidity and corporate structure with effortless authority. He commanded the room, his bespoke suit hiding the profound exhaustion of the last four days.

Then, Joe shifted gears.

"Mr. Rothwood, the markets are certainly responding well to this newfound independence," Joe began, leaning forward. "But there is a... human element to your recent restructuring that the public finds incredibly compelling."

Lance’s jaw clenched. The temperature in the studio seemed to drop ten degrees. "My personal life is off-limits, Joe. You know the parameters."

Joe held his hands up in a placating gesture. "I understand. But you have to admit, people are curious. It’s no secret that you divorced Camille Deacon, and it’s no secret that you have reunited with Ms. Evangeline Foster. The narrative of the billionaire burning down his birthright for love is... well, it’s historic." Joe paused, offering a respectful but probing smile. "Is there a wedding in the near future?"

The studio audience, usually hushed, let out a collective, breathless murmur.

Lance stared at the journalist. Every instinct demanded he shut the question down, threaten legal action, and walk off the stage. He was the CEO of Rothwood Industries. He did not bleed in public.

But as he looked at the bright studio lights, he thought of Evie sitting in the sunroom in France, typing her novel, entirely unbothered by the world that used to torture her. He thought of the nine years she spent hiding in his shadow. He thought of the debt he owed her.

He didn't want to hide her anymore.

Lance leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees. The icy armor cracked, and the man who loved Evangeline Foster simply told the truth.

"I would like nothing more than to marry Evangeline," Lance said, his voice dropping into a quiet, profound register that silenced the entire room. "In fact, I should have married her eight years ago. I should have dropped to my knees the moment I realized she held my entire soul in her hands."

Joe’s eyes widened, completely caught off guard by the raw honesty. The audience went deathly still.

"But I didn't," Lance continued, his voice thick with a heavy, unapologetic remorse. "I let the Rothwood establishment define me. I let cowardice dictate my life, and I shackled myself to a marriage I never wanted, all while hiding the most brilliant, beautiful woman in the world in the shadows."

He looked directly into the camera, not seeing the millions of viewers, only seeing the faded blue shutters of a French cottage.

"I wasted so many years being incredibly, catastrophically stupid," Lance confessed, laying his failures bare for the entire world to see. "And now that I am finally ready to offer her everything—my name, my life, my absolute devotion—it turns out... she doesn't want it."

A collective gasp echoed through the studio audience. Joe looked genuinely stunned. "She... she turned you down?"

Lance offered a small, sad, incredibly tender smile. "She didn't turn me down. She just doesn't need it. She would have happily accepted a ring a decade ago, but now? Now she has found her peace simply being Evie Foster. She realized she doesn't need my name to validate her worth. And I have to live with the fact that I am the one who killed that dream for her."

The silence in the studio was absolute. The ruthless billionaire, the shark of Wall Street, had just publicly eviscerated his own pride.

Joe, visibly moved, softened his posture. "That is... incredibly candid, Lance. And heartbreaking. Is there anything we can do?"

Lance let out a short, hollow laugh. He leaned back in his chair, the weight of the confession lifting a fraction of the darkness from his chest.

"Well," Lance smiled, looking at the journalist with a spark of genuine desperation. "If you could somehow convince the woman I love to marry me, Joe, that would be everything."

The audience erupted into a wave of sympathetic applause, some wiping away tears. The interview ended not with a discussion of stock prices, but with the image of a king publicly begging for a crown he could not buy.

The Echoes in France

Three thousand miles away, the Mediterranean sun was setting.

Evie sat on the terrace of the villa, a glass of wine in her hand, entirely oblivious to the global shockwaves currently radiating from New York. She had spent the day finalizing the climax of her novel, and her mind was filled with the fictional Kingsley-Hayes family, not the Rothwood reality.

Inside the villa, however, the digital world had already caught up.

Van sat in the library, a rare, highly amused smirk plastered across his face as he watched the viral clip of the interview replay on his secure terminal. Across the mahogany table, Richard Gavel sat with a tumbler of scotch, shaking his head in sheer disbelief.

"I never thought I'd see the day," Richard murmured, taking a sip of his drink. "Lance Rothwood, practically bleeding out on national television. He really loves her, Van. He really, truly wants to marry her."

Van leaned back, crossing his massive arms. The protective fury he used to harbor for Lance had almost entirely dissipated, replaced by a strange, grudging respect. Lance hadn't just burned his empire; he had just burned his ego.