เข้าสู่ระบบALISTAIR'S POV:I just sit there and stare at Elara.I literally cannot process what just came out of her mouth. I am sitting in the quiet kitchen of Ashcroft Manor, holding a ceramic mug of stone-cold black coffee in my hands while the bright morning light streams through the tall glass windows. And the woman I have been completely, miserably in love with for seven long years just looked me right in the eye and told me that she wanted me to kiss her last night.She wanted me to kiss her. Not just last night, but for years.I open my mouth to say something, anything at all, but my jaw just hangs open. I close it. I open it again like a complete idiot. No words come out of my throat. My brain feels like it has completely shut down."I do not understand," I finally manage to say, my voice coming out rough, strained, and rasping in my chest. "I thought...""You thought I did not feel the exact same way about you?" she asks gently.A tiny, faint smile tugs at the corner of her lip
ELARA'S POV:Alistair is sitting by himself at the kitchen table, holding a plain white mug of coffee in both hands, staring blankly out the glass window at the garden. He looks just as completely exhausted as I feel. His dark hair is a messy, unbrushed heap on top of his head. His jaw is locked tight, and his gray eyes look red-rimmed, heavy, and totally lost in thought.He hears my sneakers on the tile and looks up immediately. Our eyes hit each other, and for a second, my lungs completely forget how to pull in air.He looks terrible too. He looks like he did not catch a single minute of sleep either. There are dark purple circles sitting heavy under his eyes, and his skin looks totally washed out in the morning light. He is actually still wearing the exact same button-down shirt and trousers from yesterday, both looking rumpled and wrinkled like he slept with them on, or did not sleep at all.He just sits there staring at me from across the room. I stand near the doorway starin
ELARA'S POV:I wake up feeling like I have literally been run over by a truck and that is not an exaggeration at all. My head is pounding with a dull, heavy ache right behind my eyes. My eyelids feel gritty, swollen, and raw from crying into my pillow for hours. My entire body aches with the deep kind of bone-tired exhaustion that only comes from lying wide awake all night long, replaying the exact same terrifying moment over and over again in your head.I did not sleep for a single minute. I spent the whole night staring at the walls, thinking about Alistair. I thought about the way he stood in my room, the heat coming off his body, and that fraction of an inch between our faces. The almost kiss. The look in his gray eyes right before he stopped himself. And the cold, quick way he turned around and walked out my door.I roll slowly onto my back and stare up at the ceiling. The pale pink walls are glowing now in the early morning sunlight, looking soft, warm, and familiar. Outside
ALISTAIR'S POV: I walk down the dark hallway to my own bedroom, step inside, and shut the heavy wooden door. I turn the metal lock, lean my back flat against the wood, and close my eyes tight. My heart is hammering against my ribs like a trapped wild animal. My hands are shaking so violently that I have to shove them deep into my suit pockets. My entire body feels like it is vibrating with a raw, desperate need that I cannot keep under control much longer. I almost kissed her. I was literally half an inch away. If I had not forced my own feet to freeze, I would have pulled her in and kissed her right there by her bed. And I know myself well enough to know that once I started kissing her, I would never have been able to stop. I lean my head back against the door and think about the way she stared up at me. I think about her dark green eyes digging into mine, asking me if that was really what I thought. The honest truth is that I am completely lost. I do not know what is right
ALISTAIR'S POV:I am standing right in front of Elara and she is so close to me now. Way too close. She is close enough that I can see the warm lamplight catching the tiny flecks of gold hidden deep inside her dark green eyes. She is close enough that I can track the soft curve of her lips, the delicate line of her jaw, and the smooth skin of her neck. She is close enough that I can actually feel the heat radiating off her skin, wrapping around me like a physical force pulling me down.I want to kiss her.I imagined what it would feel like to finally press my mouth against hers, to taste her skin, to hold her tight in my arms and never let her go again.And now here she is. Standing right in front of me in her bedroom. She is looking up at me with those green eyes that have haunted every single night of my life since I was a teenager.She leans in slowly. I lose all control of my own body, and I lean in too.Our lips are barely half an inch apart.I can feel her warm breath fl
ALISTAIR'S POV:"I know that is not the real reason," she says.She slides off the edge of the bed and stands up. She starts walking straight toward me, closing the physical distance between us until there is barely any space left at all.I feel the breath catch tight in my throat. She is way too close to me now. I can smell her sweet floral perfume so strongly that it makes my head spin. I can see the warm lamp light catching the dark waves of her hair, the desperate way her green eyes keep searching my face, and the small tremble in her lips.I feel completely trapped. She is standing right in front of me. I can feel the actual heat coming off her body. I want to lean down and kiss her. I want to kiss her so badly that my whole chest aches with it.**ELARA'S POV:**He is standing right in front of me now, close enough that I can feel the solid warmth of his body radiating through his clothes. He is close enough that I can see the tiny flecks of gold hidden deep inside his
Her phone buzzed.She pulled it out of her pocket. A message from Harold Wentworth, her father's lawyer."Divorce papers are ready. I've emailed them to you. Print, sign, and leave them for him. I'll handle the rest."She opened the email. Scrolled through the document. Page after page of legal lan
At seven thirty she put the pasta water on to boil, figuring she'd wait until he was actually here to cook it so it would be fresh. She sat on the couch with a book she couldn't focus on, her phone in her hand, checking it every thirty seconds like a teenager waiting for some boy to notice her. At
Celestine started cooking at three in the afternoon, flour on her hands, music playing low from her phone and the smell of tomatoes and garlic filling the whole penthouse.She made the sauce from scratch, the way her grandmother taught her when she was maybe ten years old. She rolled out the pasta
The first time Kier met Sable Morwenna was at a charity gala about six months after his father died.He was standing by the bar, looking miserable, drinking too much and wishing he could leave. And then this woman just appeared next to him, like she had materialized out of thin air."You look like







