Novels by Edwin Soft

The first month after my resignation was harder than I expected.Not financially, I had savings, and freelance editing work trickled in. But emotionally, I was unmoored. For ten years, my identity had been "Professor Wolfe." Now I was just Alexis, unemployed and living with a college student.I tried writing. Started a novel about academia and forbidden love, then deleted it when it felt too self-indulgent. Pitched essays to literary magazines and got polite rejections.Dorian had summer classes. He'd leave in the morning while I was still in bed, come home to find me in the same spot on the couch, laptop open but blank."You're depressed," he said one evening, setting down groceries."I'm adjusting.""You're depressed. There's a difference." He sat beside me. "Have you left the apartment today?""I went to get coffee.""The coffee maker is ten feet away.""Outside coffee. At the cafe.""When?"I didn't answer.He sighed. "You need structure. Purpose. Something other than staring at a

My mother showed up at my dorm three days later.I opened the door to find her standing there, face tight with fury."Mom....."She slapped me.The crack echoed in the hallway. My cheek burned."How could you?" Her voice shook. "Julie is family. She trusted you. Loved you like a son.""Can we do this inside?" I glanced around. Students were staring.She pushed past me into the room. My roommate took one look and fled."Do you have any idea what you've done?" She paced, hands clenched. "Julie is devastated. Her marriage is destroyed. And for what? Some crush on your professor?""It's not a crush.""Oh, please. You're nineteen years old. You don't know what love is.""I know what I feel.""You feel infatuated. With a man twice your age. A married man. Your aunt's husband." She spun to face me. "What's wrong with you?""Nothing is wrong with me. I fell in love. It happens.""Not like this. Not with someone so inappropriate.""He's getting divorced. We're both adults. There's nothing inap

The meeting with the Dean was scheduled for Monday morning.I spent the weekend preparing—gathering emails, reviewing university policy, consulting with a lawyer Dorian had somehow convinced me to hire."Even if nothing happened, you need representation," she'd said. Miranda Chen, sharp-eyed and no-nonsense. "Universities panic over these situations. They'll want to make an example."She was right.Monday arrived too quickly. I dressed carefully, suit, tie, the armor of professionalism. Dorian wanted to come with me."Absolutely not," I said."I should be there. I'm involved.""Which is exactly why you can't be there. It looks worse if we show up together."He hated it, but he understood.The Dean's office was on the third floor of the administration building. I'd been there dozens of times for faculty meetings, budget discussions, tenure reviews. Never like this.Dean Morrison sat behind her desk, flanked by two people I didn't recognize. HR representatives, probably."Professor Wolf

I woke to Dorian's phone buzzing relentlessly on the nightstand.He groaned, reaching for it, then froze when he saw the screen. "Shit.""What?""Aunt Julie called my mom." He showed me the notifications. Twenty-three missed calls now. Dozens of texts. "My entire family knows."My stomach dropped. "What do the texts say?"He scrolled through, face paling. "That I seduced you. That I'm destroying your marriage. That I......" He stopped. "They're not nice.""Let me see."He handed me the phone. I read through the messages, each one worse than the last.How could you do this to Julie?He's MARRIED. What's wrong with you?You should be ashamed of yourself.Stay away from him or I'm calling the university."Jesus," I muttered."My mom's is the worst." He pointed to a paragraph-long text. "She says I'm disgusting. That I've always been selfish and now I'm proving it. That Julie is like a sister to her and I betrayed the whole family.""I'm sorry.""Don't be. This isn't your fault." He took

I drove home in a daze, Dorian's ultimatum echoing in my head.*One month.”The house was dark when I arrived. I crept upstairs, expecting Julie to be asleep.She was sitting up in bed, reading lamp on."Where were you?" she asked quietly.My heart stopped. "I went for a drive. Couldn't sleep.""At one in the morning?""I needed to clear my head."She set her book down. "Alexis, what's going on?""Nothing. I'm just..""Don't lie to me." Her voice was calm but firm. "You've been different for weeks. Distant. Distracted. You barely touch me anymore."Guilt crashed over me. "Julie….""Is there someone else?"The question hung in the air like smoke.I could lie. Should lie. But I was so tired of lying."It's complicated," I whispered.Her face crumpled. "Oh God.""Nothing has happened. I swear." Not technically a lie. "But I…." I sat on the edge of the bed. "I need to be honest with you.""About what?" Tears filled her eyes."About us. About how unhappy I've been."She flinched. "How long

I kept my promise.For three weeks, I didn't push. Didn't linger after class. Didn't text. Didn't show up at faculty events.I was the perfect, distant student.It was killing me.But if Alexis wanted space, I'd give him space. Maybe he needed time to realize what he was giving up. Or maybe he'd choose his dead marriage and I'd have to accept it.Either way, the ball was in his court now.In class, I sat in my usual seat and took notes. Participated when called on. Nothing more, nothing less. Professional. Polite.And I watched him fall apart.The dark circles under his eyes deepened. His lectures grew distracted. Once, he completely lost his train of thought mid-sentence and just stood there, staring at his notes like he'd never seen them before.He looked haunted.Good, the petty part of me thought. Suffer like I'm suffering.But mostly I just wanted to hold him.************Three weeks and four days after the coffee shop, my phone rang at midnight.Unknown number. But I knew."Hel

The construction site was chaos at eight forty-five AM. Workers shouted over machinery, cement mixers rumbled, and somewhere a drill screamed. I stood at the entrance in my new clothes, clutching the portfolio Kai had delivered at seven, trying to remember how to breathe."You ready?" Kai appeared beside me, two coffee cups in hand."No." I took the coffee. "How do we do this? Do we tell people we're engaged now or….""Not yet. Today you're the lead designer. I'm the client. Professional only." His eyes flicked to my lips before he looked away. "Last night was….""A mistake?""Complicated."A black SUV pulled up and Derek Stone climbed out, carrying a briefcase. "Kai. Isla. We need to talk before the meeting."Inside the construction trailer, Derek spread papers across a table."Background check on Brandon Mitchell came back with some interesting information." Derek pulled out a file. "His company, Mitchell Properties, is connected to Richard Crane's firm through several shell corpora

I heard Isla's scream at two in the morning.I was in her room before conscious thought kicked in, pushing open the door to find her sitting up in bed, phone clutched in her hand, face pale."What happened?" I scanned the room for threats. "Is someone here?""No. It's…." She held out her phone with a shaking hand. "He knows I'm here."I took the phone and read the message. Cold fury washed over me. "How?""I don't know. I didn't tell anyone.""Did you have location services on?""I turned them off months ago.""Check your apps. All of them."She scrolled through settings. After a few minutes, she stopped. "There's something here. An app I don't recognize. It's hidden in my system files.""Let me see." The app was sophisticated, buried deep, actively tracking her location. "He installed spyware on your phone. Probably months ago.""He's been tracking me this whole time." Her voice was hollow. "Everything I did. He knew all of it."I pulled out my own phone. "Derek? I need a clean phone

My parents' backyard was cold in the October evening. Kai followed me out, closing the sliding door with a soft click."What did you need to talk about?" I wrapped my arms around myself, watching him through the dim patio light.He held out his phone without a word.I took it, my stomach dropping as I saw the photo. Me. Walking home from the subway. Taken from a distance. The timestamp showed today at four thirty.The text below made bile rise in my throat."He's been following me." My voice sounded distant. "He's been watching me.""How long?" Kai's voice was controlled, but something dangerous simmered underneath."I don't know. I thought I was being paranoid." My hands were shaking. "Sometimes I'd feel like someone was there, but I'd turn around and see nothing."Kai took the phone back, his fingers brushing mine. "Why did he send this to you?""I don't know.""Kai." I met his eyes for the first time in years. "Why would Brandon send you a photo of me?"He looked away. "Because I t

"You're distracted."I didn't look up from the construction blueprints. "I'm reviewing the timeline for the Apex opening."Derek Stone dropped into the chair across from me. "You've been staring at the same page for twenty minutes. What's really going on?"Marco was having a family dinner tonight. Which meant Isla would be there. Five years of keeping my promise to Marco that his sister was off-limits. Five years of watching her date other men and pretending I didn't care."The new lead designer starts tomorrow," I said. "Grace Kim finally made her decision.""And?""Isla Moretti."Derek's eyebrows shot up. "Marco's sister? The one you've been….""Don't." I closed the blueprints. "It's a professional relationship. She's talented.""Right. Professional." Derek's smirk was infuriating. "That's why you personally requested Grace submit her portfolio.""The Apex needs the best," I said. "Personal feelings don't factor into business decisions.""Keep telling yourself that." Derek stood, he

"You're staring again."I jerked my head away from the floor-to-ceiling windows of Moretti & Associates, my cheeks burning as my best friend Nadia appeared beside my desk with two coffee cups."I wasn't staring," I lied, accepting the latte she offered. Through the glass, I could still see him, Kai Westbrook, all six-foot-three of expensive suit and controlled power, standing on the sidewalk below talking on his phone."Right. And I'm not about to tell you that your brother just texted asking if you're coming to dinner tonight." Nadia perched on the edge of my desk, her nurse scrubs a stark contrast to my paint-stained jeans. "Which means Mr. Tall, Dark, and Emotionally Unavailable will be there too."I took a long sip of coffee to avoid responding. Kai had been Marco's best friend since their college days, which meant he'd been a fixture in my life for seven years. Seven years of polite nods across dining tables. Seven years of him looking through me like I was invisible. Seven years