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The First Night

Author: Avery Grey
last update Last Updated: 2025-10-15 05:55:05

The penthouse smelled faintly of lemon polish and cold linen. Elena’s footsteps made soft, careful sounds on the marble as she followed the house manager through rooms that shimmered with a life she’d only ever seen in magazines. Light poured in from the floor-to-ceiling windows, turning the city into a glittering map. Elena kept her hands folded in front of her like a habit, like something to hold onto when the world tilted.

“This is your suite, Mrs. Kingstone,” the house manager said, voice efficient and kind. She had a calm face that suggested she had seen every kind of human reaction and had learned none surprised her anymore. “We have stocked items to your preference, based on initial notes. If you need anything at all—”

“I will,” Elena said, though her voice sounded small in the big room. The suite was lovely—soft gray walls, a chaise by the window, a bed with a headboard so tall it swallowed the light. A dressing room the size of Elena’s old apartment gleamed quietly. On a side
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  • Married to the billionaire by contract    Signatures And Waiting Room

    The clinic waiting room smelled like antiseptic and lemon cleaner, the bright chairs lined in a careful row as if they had been rehearsed for polite conversation. Elena sat with her hands folded in her lap, the small rectangle of the consent form heavy in her palm like a decision. Damian hovered at her side, his tie loosened, eyes restless; Ethan sat opposite with his elbows on his knees and a face that looked both older and steadier than his years. Beatrice sat beside Elena, fingers wrapped around a paper cup of tea, small tremors of nervous energy in the way she twisted the napkin at the rim.Mara paced along the magazine rack with the exaggerated seriousness of someone trying to look helpful. Jackson leaned against a pillar, phone in hand, absorbing the room’s tension with the professional calm of a lawyer who knew how to translate panic into paperwork. The lab had already sent that urgent message: emergency consent required. The receptionist had guided them through forms and ID ch

  • Married to the billionaire by contract    The Message That Changed Everything

    The audit office smelled faintly of printer toner and citrus cleaner, a sterile calm that tried to mask the tension underneath. Elena sat beside Damian at the long glass table, fingers interlaced with his, watching people move like practiced ants—auditors with tablets, lawyers with unreadable faces, Jackson whispering into his phone. Ethan stood behind her, arms folded, eyes steady and guarded. Mara hovered near the doorway, ready with a sympathetic smile and a box of tissues just in case.“No one expects family matters in the middle of audits,” Elena said under her breath, the words barely a breath between them.Damian’s hand tightened around hers.“You okay?” he asked, voice low.She forced a small smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “As okay as one can be when intercepts happen and your husband is supposed to be proving he’s clean.”He winced at the word husband like it was both an honor and a weight. “We’ll get through this,” he said. “They need time to trace the transfer. I’v

  • Married to the billionaire by contract    The Morning After The Silence

    The morning sunlight slipped gently through the tall curtains, spilling gold over the cream sheets where Elena lay. For a moment, she didn’t move — her eyes fluttered open slowly, her head still resting on the pillow that smelled faintly like Damien’s cologne. That familiar musky scent mixed with cedarwood made her heart ache and flutter all at once.Her fingers brushed the empty space beside her, and reality sank in. He wasn’t there.He had left early again.She sat up, clutching the sheet to her chest as she glanced around the room. His cufflinks were still on the nightstand, and his tie — the one she had loosened herself last night — was draped carelessly over the back of the chair.Memories of his hands on her, his voice whispering her name, came rushing back, and her cheeks warmed.But right after those memories came the ache.The way he’d pulled away the moment they had finished. The quiet tension that had lingered like an invisible wall between them.Elena ran a shaky hand thro

  • Married to the billionaire by contract    A Small, True Vow

    The room smelled like late-summer lilies and coffee, the two scents braided together into something domestic and rooted. Elena smoothed the hem of her simple dress with fingers that trembled just a little; it was the kind of dress she had sketched once in a tired notebook when she’d been imagining a life that felt possible. Today it fit like a decision. The community center had been quiet all morning as volunteers set chairs and children taped paper hearts on the windows. Someone had strung fairy lights; someone else had found a stack of mismatched plates.Damian stood by the front table, hands folded in a way that made his knuckles pale. He wore a plain shirt, no cufflinks, no tailored jacket—his usual armor softened into something honest. The bruise that had once shadowed his temple was faded; the lines near his eyes were gentler, as if sleep and small kindnesses had started reconstructing him. When he looked at Elena now, the look was not the controlled, measured gaze of a CEO maki

  • Married to the billionaire by contract    By Choice

    The studio smelled like makeup and coffee and a kind of electricity that made Elena’s palms cool. The panel lights were bright and unforgiving; the cameras hovered like waiting birds. Behind the glass, the control room murmured with the low, efficient chatter of people who measured reactions in decibels and pixels. Mara had given Elena a quick squeeze when they’d arrived—the small, human touch that meant more than any practiced encouragement.Damian was already seated at the center table when she walked in. He wore a simple dark sweater and jeans, nothing corporate, nothing designed to impress; he looked like a man trying to be ordinary in a world that kept offering extraordinary accusations. His hair was combed but not precisely; his jaw had a faint shadow. When he looked up and saw Elena, his expression changed immediately—softened, brightened, like someone who’d been holding his breath and could finally breathe.“You look tired,” she said quietly as she took the seat opposite him.

  • Married to the billionaire by contract    The Word That Changed Everything

    The microphones leaned in like hungry seeds; the shutters blinked until the world felt smaller, concentrated around the thin line between breath and speech. Elena stood with Damian’s hand still in hers, the press circling like a tide. For a sliver of a second everything fell away: the kids at the community center in murmured clusters, volunteers watching with anxious faces, Ethan’s steady presence at the edge of the room. The only thing that mattered was the heat in her palm where his was wrapped around her fingers.A hundred questions hung in the air and her first syllable—I—had been a bridge she hadn’t yet crossed. The room hummed with expectation. Reporters scribbled and cameras swung like predatory birds.She steadied herself, felt the small, solid pulse at the base of his thumb under her palm, and let the truth that lived in her chest come out like a tide.“I—” she began again, and this time the syllable didn’t break. “I never stopped loving him.”Her voice was softer than the mi

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