LOGINHer hands moved from my shoulders to my face, her palms cupping my jaw, her thumbs stroking my cheeks. It was a gesture of such unexpected tenderness it nearly undid me. Her eyes, dark and dazed, locked onto mine. In them, I saw not the woman I had wronged, but the woman I was with, in this moment,
Her hand anchored hard against the back of my head, fingers tangling in my hair, holding me exactly where she needed me. For a moment, I wasn't the man who had failed her. I was just a man giving her pleasure. She said my name once, twice, the third time broken completely, and her whole body arched
Edward's POV Her mouth was on mine when I got the door open. I walked her backward into the room, the city lights filtering through the window in thin strips that barely illuminated the space. Her hands were already at my collar, working open the buttons of my shirt with an urgency that sent a jol
Alicia's POV The restaurant Edmund had not arranged. Edward had seen it from the car on the second day and remembered it. No assistant. No agenda attached to the table. We walked there. He asked about Lily before we reached the first corner. "Is she still seeing the cardiologist every three mon
I ordered wine. The work wasn't finished. The room was quieter. She took the glass without comment. Drank. Set it down and kept writing. She spoke about the eastern corridor communities directly, without framing or adjustment, as if they existed in the room with us. Her hand moved as she talked, m
Edward's POV The door opened behind me. No knock. She came in already talking. "I need your numbers from Rotterdam before we fix anything else," she said. "The version you gave him assumes—" She stopped. I didn't turn immediately. Just reached for the towel, dragged it once over my face, then
Alicia’s POV Sunday morning arrived pale and quiet. I sat on the couch, coffee cooling in my hands. Elena was in the armchair angled toward me, mug balanced on the armrest, untouched. Between us lay the folder. Brown manila. The type you’d use for taxes. Except it wasn’t taxes. We’d been like th
Edward's POV The estate looked the same as it always did, manicured hedges, perfectly aligned stone pathway, the kind of wealth that announced itself through restraint rather than display. I'd grown up here. Knew every room. Every corner. Every shadow. It still felt like walking into a trap. I p
“That’s not an easy thing to sort out,” he said. “Yeah.” “Especially when it’s been broken before.” I looked at him. He kept his gaze forward, face composed but knowing. “I’m not asking you to explain,” he added. “Just saying trust isn’t automatic. It shouldn’t be.” I turned back to the window,
Edward's POV Saturday arrived the way weekends always did when you had nothing to fill them with. Slowly. Relentlessly. Without mercy. I woke at six-thirty out of habit. The apartment was silent. Too big for one person. I'd never really noticed that before. In nearly three years of marriage,







