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Chapter 136: Unfinished
publish date:
2026-09-17 22:40:58
Latest chapter
Across The Ice: Falling for my ex’s biggest rival Chapter 143: Clipped Wings
“Iris, I have to.” Dean’s voice was quiet, resigned in a way I had never heard from him before. He sat across from me in the stripped-bare room, surrounded by the last traces of a life that no longer felt like mine. “I don’t have a choice. My father has been there for me my whole life. This is my chance to protect him for once instead of letting him be the one protecting me.”“How long are you going to keep doing this?” I asked, folding my hands in my lap to stop them from shaking. “How long are you going to keep sacrificing yourself for a family that keeps taking everything from you?”His gaze dropped to the floor. “I don’t have a reason not to anymore.”There was no argument I could make against that. The fight I had been holding on to slipped out of me, leaving behind an exhausted calm that felt more frightening than anger. I looked around the room at the half-packed boxes, the bare shelves, and the pale rectangles on the walls where photographs had once hung. Everything had alread
Across The Ice: Falling for my ex’s biggest rival Chapter 142: The Valedictorian
I stood at the podium in my cap and gown, looking out over the sea of Northbridge graduates. Somewhere in the crowd, my father had his phone, probably recording every second, whether I wanted him to or not. For one suspended moment, the noise, the cameras, and the heat of the afternoon faded, leaving only the long road that had brought me there.“Two years ago,” I began, keeping my voice steady despite the tremor beneath it, “my life became a headline I never asked to be part of. I lost a scholarship I had earned. I lost people I thought I could trust. For months, I was told who I was supposed to be based on things that had happened to me instead of the choices I made afterward.”I found my father in the crowd. He watched me with the same quiet pride he had carried through every awful part of the last two years, and seeing him there gave me somewhere to place my focus.“What I learned is that the story other people write about you is never the whole truth. You get to write your own ve
Across The Ice: Falling for my ex’s biggest rival Chapter 141: What the Living Owe
The church was full by the time Ava and I arrived, all dark suits, lowered voices, and the particular hush that settled over places built for grief. She had driven back with me the moment I told her about the headline, and now she slid into the pew beside me while I searched the crowd for Mason. I found him near the front with his shoulders drawn tight and his younger sister tucked against his side, both of them facing the altar as if looking anywhere else might make the day more real.Dean arrived a few minutes later and took the pew across the aisle without saying anything. He glanced at me once, then faced forward. I gave him a small nod, and that was enough. His presence needed no explanation.The service moved slowly through hymns, readings, and a eulogy from one of Mason’s aunts, whose voice cracked twice as she described a woman who had spent decades holding a difficult family together with patience and quiet love. I kept thinking about the hospital room months earlier, when Mr
Across The Ice: Falling for my ex’s biggest rival Chapter 140: What Comes Next
Mrs. Sinclair knew something was wrong before we were fully inside. Her smile faded as her gaze moved from Ava to Ryan, then back to Ava again, and she stepped aside to let us into the living room. “Sweetheart, what’s wrong?”Ava opened her mouth, but no words came. Ryan came in behind us and took her hand, his thumb moving over her knuckles as if the small, familiar gesture could lend her enough courage to say what we had come to say.“I’m pregnant.”She got the words out quickly, before fear could stop her.The room went quiet. Mr. Sinclair lowered the newspaper he had been reading, while Mrs. Sinclair’s hand rose to her mouth. For a moment, no one seemed to know which question to ask first. Then her mother set the newspaper aside and focused on Ava.“How long have you known?”“A few weeks.”“How far along are you?”“Almost two months.”“Does Ryan’s family know?”“Not yet. We wanted to tell you first.”The questions followed one another after that, practical and immediate. Graduatio
Across The Ice: Falling for my ex’s biggest rival Chapter 139: Going Home
I walked out of Becker Hall into a wall of noise. Students spilled down the steps around me, phones held high, voices rising over one another, while someone nearby had already opened a bottle of something that was almost certainly against campus rules. Ava waited at the bottom, and the moment she saw me, she pulled me into a hug.“We’re done,” she murmured against my shoulder.“I know.” I held on for another second before letting her go.She studied my face. “You don’t look happy.”“I am happy.” I meant it, even with the hollow place inside me that graduation hadn’t managed to fill. “I just don’t know what I’m supposed to do with myself now that it’s actually over.”Fielding & Marsh had confirmed my start date the week before. I was due to begin a month after graduation, which gave me enough time to rest and prepare. Junior Communications Specialist. A real title, a real desk, and a real salary I had earned without anyone handing it to me. I should have felt relieved. Instead, as I wa
Across The Ice: Falling for my ex’s biggest rival Chapter 138: Another Battle
My father called two nights before my last exam. I answered halfway through a yawn, three energy drinks into a reading I still had not finished.“I got it,” he said, skipping any greeting. “It’s a smaller school, and the paycheck is smaller than before, but it’s mine. They called this afternoon.”“Dad, that’s amazing.”“The department head said my old colleagues spoke so highly of me that she barely needed to interview me twice.” His voice carried the warm, pleased note it always took on when he was trying not to sound too proud. “I’m going to be fine, Iris. Better than fine.”When we hung up, I found myself smiling, which was a welcome change from the expression I had been wearing for the past few days. Since the night I walked away from Dean in that parking lot, I had carried a knot of guilt that refused to loosen. My father’s new job couldn’t give him back the twenty-two years he had lost, and it couldn’t erase everything that had happened, but it gave him somewhere solid to land.
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