LOGINJANICE'S POVI can't stop staring at the photograph sitting in the middle of Eden's dining table because suddenly everything makes sense and absolutely nothing does.The surveillance image remains spread out beneath the apartment lights while nobody says a word for several seconds, and the silence feels heavier than any argument we've had so far.Amanda breaks first."Oh, hell no."Nobody disagrees.Eden remains staring at the image.Not defending her, not exactly.Just struggling to connect the woman he knew with the woman sitting across from a reporter investigating his family.Richard leans forward and rubs a hand across his jaw."Maybe there's another explanation."Amanda immediately turns toward him."Name one."Richard opens his mouth, then closes it.Amanda points at him. "Exactly."Despite everything, a tiny part of me almost laughs because nothing about this feels funny.Amara flips through several documents."The meeting wasn't a one-time event."That gets everyone's attenti
EDEN'S POVThe photograph refuses to leave my mind.Not because of what it shows, but because of who has it, because somebody deliberately searched for that photograph, somebody found it and somebody wanted it found.The meeting breaks apart slowly after Amara reveals the pictures, but nobody actually leaves emotionally and the tension follows all of us through the apartment like an unwanted guest.Janice sits quietly on the couch with her arms folded tightly across her chest while Amanda remains beside her, and for the first time since I've known her, Amanda looks genuinely worried.Amara spreads documents across the dining table and immediately takes control."This stopped being celebrity gossip a while ago." Her finger taps several pages. "At first it looked random, but now it doesn't."Richard leans forward. "What changed?""The pattern."Nobody interrupts.Amara flips through another file."The reporter started with Duncan Enterprises, then Chloe, then old hospital records, then
JANICE'S POVOne phone call changes everything.The moment I lower the phone and tell Eden someone from the press has started asking questions, the fragile peace we've spent weeks building begins cracking all over again because secrets are dangerous, but public secrets are worse."How much do they know?" Eden immediately pushes away from the window and starts walking toward me.I shake my head."I don't know."The answer sounds pathetic even to me.For a second neither of us speaks.The city glows beyond the hospital windows while distant voices drift through the hallway, but suddenly all I can hear is my own heartbeat.Because this isn't about me and never was, it's about Jack, always Jack, and that's why the next morning the hospital feels different to me, not openly dangerous but watched, as though invisible eyes are following every movement.A nurse pauses a little longer than usual while speaking to Eden, two visitors whisper near the elevators, and I catch someone taking a photo
EDEN'S POVFor a moment I can't answer.Not because the question is difficult but because it's easy.Jack sits in his hospital bed hugging the giant dinosaur Chan sent him while looking up at me with complete trust, and suddenly every possible answer disappears except the truth.My eyes drift toward the window for a second before returning to him."Yeah."Jack waits, so I keep going.A lump forms in my throat."Yeah, buddy." My voice comes out rougher than expected and I have to clear it once. "I would've stayed."The smile that spreads across his face is immediate like there was never another possible answer. Like he never doubted me for a second.The realization hurts more than it should because outside the room, hidden beyond the partially open door, Janice hears every word.I don't know she's there, I don't see her but the answer reaches her anyway.For five years she carried the belief that she was protecting people, and now three simple words remind her of the choice she took aw
JANICE'S POVThe truth is finally out.For five years I feared the revelation and spent countless nights imagining what would happen when Eden learned the truth, yet somehow everything feels more uncertain now than it did before because secrets are predictable.The future isn't.Morning arrives with good news, actual good news. The kind doctors rarely deliver without adding a dozen warnings afterward.Jack's recovery continues improving and every specialist who enters his room seems slightly more optimistic than the last, while nurses smile more often and conversations about discharge begin appearing in medical discussions.For the first time since his collapse, going home feels real.Jack takes the news exactly as expected."Days?" He stares at the doctor like she's personally insulted him. "You said days."The cardiologist barely looks impressed. "That's generally how recovery works."Jack throws both hands into the air. "I've already been trapped here forever.""You've been here tw
EDEN'S POVI don't leave but I don't stay close either.The words I spoke to Janice last night still sit heavily between us and every time I look at her, I hear them again.The worst part is that both things are true.By morning the hospital is already awake as nurses move through hallways carrying charts, doctors begin rounds and patients slowly emerge from rooms in search of coffee and better news, while I sit beside Jack's bed trying to focus on the only thing that feels simple right now.Him.Because Jack isn't complicated.Jack likes dinosaurs, Jack hates vegetables. Jack asks too many questions. Jack exists completely outside the war happening inside my head.He glances up from a dinosaur coloring book and narrows his eyes suspiciously."You look tired." I let out a laugh. "Thanks.""I'm serious." He points a crayon at me. "Your face looks sleepy.""That's somehow worse."Jack nods confidently. "I know."The answer comes with so much certainty that I can't stop smiling.For a li
JANICE'S POVI finish Chloe's letter just after midnight and by the last page I'm crying so hard that the words keep blurring together, forcing me to wipe my eyes again and again before I can continue reading.The letter isn't what I expected.It isn't instructions, demands or another impossible pr
EDEN'S POVJanice won't answer me.Not directly, not completely and not in any way that gives me the certainty I'm looking for, but at some point her silence stopped feeling like avoidance and started feeling like an answer all on its own. The problem is that silence doesn't tell me what to do nex
JANICE'S POVThe moment those words leave my mouth, I know everything is changing.Eden heard what I didn't say, heard the truth hidden inside the silence and the tears, and he's far too smart to ignore it now. I can still see his face when I close my eyes, still see the realization settling behin
EDEN'S POVThe cardiologist's question follows me out of the hospital.It follows me into the elevator, into my car and all the way back to Manhattan, because no matter how many times I replay the conversation, the outcome never changes.Nobody asks a question like that by mistake.By the next morn







