Chapter 031 The Second Betrayal

—Ethan

I was left in the void that she created.

Still.

Blank.

Cold.

Not the cold that I wore like gold. But the kind that eats away at your very bones, your body too weakened for the world.

Sophia was gone.

And I let her go.

I ran both hands over my face, elbows planted in my knees, my body curled into the chair as though it alone kept my shape. My jaw throbbed with the effort of tension. The silence in the room wasn't quiet. It screamed at me. Echoing with all that hadn't been said. All that could have been altered.

I have dedicated my whole life to planning.

Power.

Repayment

Every calculated step, each move on the board, all for the title they aimed to take from me. And when, finally, I’d held it in my hand—firm, unfractured—I’d managed to lose the one thing which ever made it worthwhile.

Sophia

Sh*t.

I thought I was protecting her.

Protecting her from the wreckage of my past.

And still, I’d pulled her in. I’d done the very thing that I’d promised myself I would never do to any o