LOGINShe called instead of showing up unannounced, which I appreciated more than I expected to."I know this is strange," Vanessa said, when I picked up. "I wanted to ask if I could come by. Not to talk about work, or Daxton, or anything complicated. I owe you an apology, and I'd rather give it to your face than hide behind a phone."I hesitated only a moment before agreeing, curious despite everything, and she arrived at my apartment an hour later, standing in my doorway looking smaller somehow than she ever had at the office, none of her usual polish quite fitting the moment."Come in," I said, stepping back.Rowan was sitting on the living room floor, carefully stacking blocks. He was focused and determined, like a one-year-old who believed he had to build everything by himself. Vanessa immediately looked at him, and a complicated emotion showed on her face."He's beautiful," she said quietly."Thank you."We sat at my small table, the same table where so much of the last year's hardest
Daxton came by two days after I'd gone to see Vanessa, and I told him about the visit before he could say anything else, wanting him to hear it from me first.He sat quietly through the whole account, his jaw tightening at the part about Rowan, something pained crossing his face."She said that," he repeated, when I finished. "About him not being mine.""She did," I said. "It hurt. I won't pretend it didn't. But I understood, by the end of it, why she said it. That doesn't excuse it. It just made it easier to see past.""I'm going to talk to her," he said. "Not about us. About that. She doesn't get to say something like that to you and just walk away without hearing from me too."He went to the office the next morning and found her already at her desk, the way she always was, early, composed, giving nothing away."Can we talk," he said. "Not about work."She looked up, something guarded settling over her features immediately."I know why you're here," she said. "Serenity told you what
I didn't plan to go to Vanessa. It happened almost the way most of the hardest choices in my life had happened lately, born less out of a clear plan and more out of finally running out of patience for waiting on someone else to fix something that mattered to me.I found her address through the company directory Daxton had given me access to months ago, back when things were simpler, and drove there on a Tuesday afternoon while Rowan was with Dana for the day.She opened the door looking surprised, then quickly composed, the same careful mask she wore at the office sliding into place."Serenity," she said. "This is unexpected.""Can I come in? Five minutes. That's all I need."She hesitated, then stepped back, letting me into an apartment that was sleek and orderly in a way that somehow didn't surprise me at all."I'm not here to yell at you," I said, once she'd gestured me toward a chair I didn't take. "I've done enough of that in my own head this past week. I'm here because I need to
Daxton didn't call the next day. I noticed his silence more than I expected. One part of me was relieved because I didn't have to figure out what to say yet but another part of me still hurt because he hadn't called.Dana stayed with me throughout the weekend, she didn't pressure me to make any decisions or tell me what to do, she was simply there for me, as she had always been, giving me the support I needed when I needed it most.“You don’t have to know how you feel yet,” she said Saturday morning as she watched me move the eggs around my plate without eating them. “It’s okay if you don’t know what you want or how you feel for a while.”"I keep replaying it," I admitted. "The way his hands didn't move.....the way he just stood there. I keep trying to decide if that means something different than if he'd pulled away the second she touched him, and I can't land anywhere solid.""Maybe it does mean something," Dana said."Maybe it means he's human, and got caught off guard, and made a
Aldric Voss called at nine in the morning, which was unusual enough on its own that Cordelia knew before she even answered that he had something."I have confirmation," he said, without any preamble at all. "A city. A name close enough that I'm comfortable calling it certain, unless there is a very unlikely coincidence.”Cordelia set down the letter she'd been reading and gave him her full attention."Go on.""She's using the name Anne Grayson," he said. "Middle name moved to the front, surname kept the same, which is honestly a fairly common pattern for someone trying to stay findable to people who genuinely need to find her while staying invisible to a casual search. She runs a small contract consulting business. There's a child, a boy, just over a year old now based on the birth records I finally tracked down properly."Cordelia stayed completely still, the confirmation didn’t shock her as much as she expected. Instead, it gave her a quiet feeling of certainty. It was like hearing
By the third hour of silence, I couldn't sit still anymore.I called Dana, who happened to be staying in town for a few more days after a visit, and she came over without hesitation, letting herself stay with a sleeping Rowan while I drove to the office, my hands tight on the wheel the entire way.The building was mostly dark by the time I got there, only a few floors lit, Daxton's among them. The night guard recognized me and waved me through without question, the way he always did now.I took the elevator up, my heart pounding harder with every floor, and stepped out into a hallway that was quiet except for a low murmur of voices coming from Daxton's office, the door not quite fully closed.I slowed as I approached, some instinct telling me to be careful before I understood exactly what I was being careful of."You've been so tense lately," Vanessa was saying, her voice soft, closer than professional distance would ever allow. "I can see it. The stress of everything, her, the compan
I don't even remember how I got out of Jason’s office.One minute I was looking at the man I loved handing me divorce papers the next, I was trapped inside the elevator, staring at my reflection in the mirrored walls.The woman looking back at me was a stranger,her lipstick was smeared,her eyes wer
Twenty-four hours. That was how long I lasted as Mrs. Crane, I stared at the papers on Jason’s desk. I kept waiting for the words to scramble into a joke, but they just sat there, heavy and permanent.DIVORCE AGREEMENT.My throat went completely dry just a few hours ago. I'd woken up in his bed w
I didn't sleep that night, or the night after.Every time I closed my eyes, the photographs burned into my eyelids.The dark hotel room,the man with the blurred face,my body and features,the total ruin of the only night that had ever felt real to me.I sat on the edge of the sagging mattress in a c
I spent most of my wedding pretending I wasn't terrified.The fake smile on my face must have been convincing enough because nobody questioned it,guests toasted us, cameras flashed, and champagne flowed like water.Everyone kept gushing about what a perfect couple we made. I just smiled, nodded, an







