A pause on the other end. Then a voice — professional, hesitant, like the caller had been steeling themselves for this moment.

Tony sat up. The name hit him like a punch to the chest. Eleanor. He hadn’t heard that name in years. A weekend. A conference. A blur of expensive whiskey and bad decisions he’d buried so deep he’d almost convinced himself it never happened.

The world didn’t stop. The city lights still flickered beyond the window. But something in Tony’s chest cracked, barely audible, like a hairline fracture in glass.

Silence stretched like a wire about to snap.