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Chapter 132
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2026-04-20 06:06:10
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Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 139
Damien's POVThere is a version of this that I planned.Not the specific evening, I didn't plan a specific evening. But the concept of it. The moment when the trial was behind us and the press had moved on to other things and she had gone a full day without checking the news alerts and I could look at her across a room and know that the thing between us was not being shared with anything else.I planned to do something deliberate about it then.Say something. Make some gesture toward the territory we had been circling since before any of this started.What actually happens is: I make pasta.She comes home from Morrison at seven-fifteen on a Tuesday evening, three weeks after the sentencing, and she comes in and drops her bag by the door and takes off her jacket and comes into the kitchen and leans against the counter and says nothing, just watches me cook. The way she has been doing this more frequently lately coming into a room and simply existing in it without needing the room to pr
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 137
Lila's POVBeep! Beep! Beep!I picked up my phone as it rang, I have been expecting her call since the sentence,not immediately thought, not the night of, when the coverage was everywhere and my phone was lit up with messages from mutual friends who wanted to know how she was and whether I'd spoken to her. That night I sent her one text: "I'm here when you're ready." And I meant it to land as permission rather than pressure."Hi," she says."Hi." I am already at my kitchen table with coffee and the particular readiness of someone who has been waiting for a call they knew was coming. "How are you?"A pause."Strange," she says."Strange good or strange bad?""Strange new," she says. "Like the weather changed and my body hasn't figured out what to wear yet."I think about that."That sounds about right," I say."Damien said it's going to take time.""Damien is correct.""He usually is." A pause that contains something warm in it, the specific quality of a woman talking about her hus
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 136
Esmeralda's POVI wake up and there is nothing to prepare for, that is the first thought that came to my mind, not a relieved thought or a triumphant one. Just a simple fact.The particular awareness of a body that has been oriented toward something for so long that the absence of it is its own sensation.There was no testimony to rehearse, no motion to fight, no article to respond to.No Julian.I lie still and let the quiet of that settle.Damien is asleep beside me, actually asleep, the deep even breathing of someone whose body finally believed the alert could be stood down. He slept the way he hasn't since before any of this started. I noticed it in the night, woke briefly at three and heard him breathing and thought: “good.” And went back to sleep myself.Now it is seven in the morning and the room is grey and still.I look at the ceiling.*****The first thing I feel is not what I expected.I expected relief. Or something like triumph, the clean, earned satisfaction of a thing c
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 135
Esmeralda's POVHe stands up and tells the truth.I hear every word, but I didn't bother to not look at him.Not because I can't, not because looking would cost me something I can't afford to spend today. But because his statement is not for me, it is for the record, for the room, for whatever version of himself he is trying to become in the wreckage of the version he was. That is his work to do. Not mine to witness.But I hear something that got my attention “Morrison Manufacturing was not failing. It was a healthy company run by a man who understood what he built.”The judge's face gives nothing away.Mine gives nothing away.Underneath both of those surfaces, I don't know what is happening in her. In me, there is something moving that I don't have a name for yet. Something that started when he said my father's name. Something that has not finished arriving.“That decision killed that man's belief in himself in the last years of his life.”My hands are flat on the table.I let the
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 134
Julian's POVThe judge asks if I wish to make a statement.Richard told me I didn't have to. Told me that in cases like this, statements from defendants before sentencing often do more harm than good, they invite scrutiny, create new material for the record, give the prosecution a final opportunity to respond.He told me to consider carefully.I considered it and stood up.*****The room is very quiet when I stand.The particular quiet of a space that has been loud all day, testimony, argument, the weight of accumulated words suddenly holding its breath.I don't look at the gallery.I don't look at the plaintiff's table.I look at the judge.She is watching me with the expression she has maintained throughout the entire proceeding, attentive, measured, giving nothing away.I speak.*****"I am not going to argue against the prosecution's recommendation," I say. "I'm not going to ask for leniency I haven't earned or suggest that the sentence proposed is disproportionate. It isn't. What
Ashes Of His Regret Chapter 133
Esmeralda's POVMatheson stands for the defense counter argument and He speaks for twenty-two minutes.I listen to every word.He does not dispute the financial figures. He cannot, Dr. Reeves' testimony is airtight and Julian's guilty plea makes the factual record immovable. What Matheson disputes is the weight the prosecution has assigned to them. He argues for context, the pressures of high-level corporate environments, the normalized practices of aggressive acquisition strategy, the distinction between a man who did harm and a man who intended to destroy.He uses the word *complexity* again.He asks the court to consider that fifteen years is disproportionate for crimes that, while serious, did not involve physical violence.He asks the court to consider Julian's cooperation, the guilty plea, the lack of a prolonged trial, the resources saved by a defendant who chose to accept responsibility.He asks the court to consider the man Julian Voss is today versus the man he was when the
Ashes Of His Regret CHAPTER 53
DAMIEN'S POVI watched the footage three times.It's from the coffee shop. Angle from the security camera across the street. You can barely see their faces but I can read body language.The way Julian leans forward.The way Esmeralda leans back.The flowers he brought that she left behind.Marcus
Huling Na-update : 2026-03-28Ashes Of His Regret CHAPTER 77
ESMERALDA'S POVMy phone wakes me at 6:23 AM.Not the alarm. The buzzing.Constant, relentless buzzing.Text after text after text.I grab it, still half asleep.47 missed calls.132 text messages.What the—Then I see the news alert.BREAKING: Is Hale Marriage a Fraud? Contract Details ExposedMy
Huling Na-update : 2026-04-05Ashes Of His Regret CHAPTER 58
DAMIEN'S POVThe footage is grainy but clear enough.Table 14 at Lucienne. Camera angle from the bar.Her foot. His foot.Under the table where she thinks no one can see.I watch it three times.Then pour another drink.Then watch it again.The way she leans forward when she talks. The way he mirro
Huling Na-update : 2026-03-30Ashes Of His Regret CHAPTER 7
JULIAN'S POVThe weekend in the Hamptons was exactly what I needed. Vivienne's beach house, her children running along the shore, dinners without tension or tears. Alexander and Sophia call me "Uncle Julian" now, their small hands reaching for mine when we walk.It felt like family. Real family. No
Huling Na-update : 2026-03-17
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