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Chapter 23
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2025-07-08 15:46:15
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LOVE AGAINST LEGACY Chapter 24
Chapter 24CELESTE POINT OF VIEW I place fresh flowers in the vase on Adrian's nightstand, peonies, their petals unfurling in soft layers of white and palest pink. I've chosen them carefully, wanting something gentle, something that might bring a moment's peace to the man who now moves through our home like a ghost.Adrian hasn't slept in our bed for eight nights. I lie awake, listening for his footsteps, only to find him at dawn slumped in his study chair, staring at nothing, papers untouched before him. Dark circles deepen beneath his eyes. His clothes hang looser on his frame. Food remains untouched on his plate when he bothers to sit for meals at all.Something terrible has happened. Something he won't share.From the bedroom window, I watch him now, walking aimlessly around the garden in the morning mist. Not the purposeful strides of a man heading somewhere, but the distracted wandering of someone lost within himself. He pauses by the rose bushes, touching a bloom without seein
LOVE AGAINST LEGACY Chapter 23
Chapter 23ANDRIAN POINT OF VIEW Rain pounds my windshield as I drive toward the cabin, wipers struggling against the downpour. Five days now. Five days of silence. Five days of growing fear that twists my stomach into knots that won't loosen.The Rio flight using Elias's passport has only deepened the mystery. Someone creating a false trail. But who? And why? And where is Elias now?I called in sick for the first time in my professional life, unable to maintain the facade of normalcy any longer. Let the company wonder. Let Grandfather worry. Let the stock drop. None of it matters compared to finding Elias.The cabin appears through the rain-blurred windshield, dark and silent among dripping trees. I've already searched it twice, finding nothing, no clues, no messages, no trace of what might have happened. But something pulls me back here today, some instinct I can't ignore.I park and run through the rain to the covered porch, fumbling with cold-numbed fingers for the key hidden abo
LOVE AGAINST LEGACY Chapter 22
Chapter 22Three days. Seventy-two hours. Four thousand, three hundred and twenty minutes.Each passing second stretches the hole in my chest wider, deeper, until breathing itself becomes something I have to think about. My phone stays clutched in my hand from morning until night, screen checked compulsively for messages that never come.Where is Elias? Is he safe? Is he...No. I refuse to complete that thought, though it haunts my sleepless nights, my distracted days, my every waking moment.Claudia searched Elias's Chicago apartment, finding it untouched, mail piled up, plants dying from lack of water. His office reported he called in sick the day after he supposedly returned. His credit cards show no activity. His phone stays dead, calls going straight to voicemail.A man doesn't just vanish. Not without help. Not without someone making him disappear.I sit at my desk, staring at financial reports without seeing them. Numbers blur before my eyes, meaningless symbols that can't pene
LOVE AGAINST LEGACY Chapter 21
Chapter 21ANDRIAN POINT OF VIEWMy burner phone buzzes in my jacket pocket during the Tuesday board meeting. I let it sit, untouched, through an hour of profit projections and market analyses that feel like torture. But my mind stays fixed on what that buzz might mean, another message from Elias, maybe confirming final details for our London escape, now just ten days away.When the meeting finally ends, I slip into an empty conference room, my heart hammering as I check the phone. The message is simple:*Tonight. Cabin. 9 PM. Last meeting before London. Important news.*I type back fast: *I'll be there*.Then I delete both messages, tuck the phone away, and go back to my regular device, my regular life, the performance that's become as natural as breathing. But under that calm surface, excitement hums. Ten more days. Then freedom.***The cabin's windows are dark when I arrive at 9:17 PM. No welcoming light, no sign of Elias's rental car in the usual spot. I frown, checking my watch.
LOVE AGAINST LEGACY Chapter 20
Chapter 20Celeste point of view "More to the left, Mrs. Lancaster. And perhaps touch your husband's arm? Yes, perfect."The photographer circles us like a hungry shark, camera clicking in rapid bursts. I maintain my smile, hand resting lightly on Adrian's sleeve as instructed. We stand in the Lancaster estate garden, roses blooming behind us, sunlight catching on my diamond earrings and his platinum watch. A picture-perfect couple in a picture-perfect setting.All of it fake. All of it planned."Now perhaps looking at each other? As if sharing a private joke?" The photographer demonstrates the expression he wants, a manufactured intimacy that makes my stomach tighten.I turn toward Adrian, finding him already watching me with an unreadable expression. For a moment, genuine connection flickers between us, not love or desire, but a shared understanding of our predicament. Both trapped in this performance."Beautiful!" The camera clicks frantically. "The markets will love this."The ma
LOVE AGAINST LEGACY Chapter 19
Chapter 19ELIAS POINT OF VIEW Rain hammers against the cabin windows, drops racing down glass like tears. I pace the small living room, checking my watch again. 8:42 PM. Adrian is late. Adrian is never late.Unless he's not coming at all.The thought sends fresh panic through me. After watching that gala footage, after seeing Adrian with his wife, doubt has taken root in places I thought were sealed by trust. Has he changed his mind? Chosen the safer path of his marriage? Decided I'm not worth the risk?Headlights sweep across the walls suddenly, a car approaching through the storm. I move to the window, peering through rain-blurred glass at the vehicle pulling up outside. Relief floods through me as I recognize Adrian's car, followed immediately by the tension of what's about to happen.I open the door before he can knock. We stand facing each other across the threshold—Adrian soaked from the dash from car to porch, water dripping from his hair, his clothes, his eyelashes. For a mo
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