Chapter 1: The Longest Goodbye

AMELIA

I came when Victor did, out of habit more than anything else. 

A tiny, polite gasp, the kind I’d perfected over the last three years of marriage. My fingers curled against his back, nails barely pressing through the silk pajama shirt he insisted on wearing to bed. He shuddered, groaned my name like he’d just closed a billion-dollar deal, and rolled off me with a satisfied sigh.

“God, Amelia, you’re perfect,” he murmured into my hair, already half asleep.

I stared at the ceiling in the dark, thighs still pressed together, the ache between them dull and familiar. Perfect. Sure. If perfect meant faking every single orgasm for the last eighteen months, then yeah, I was wife of the year.

Victor’s breathing evened out within minutes. I waited another five, then slipped from the bed, padded barefoot to the bathroom, and turned the shower on cold. The shock of the water made me shiver, but it was better than lying next to him feeling like a fraud. I let the spray hit my face until the tears I refused to cry mixed with the water and disappeared down the drain.

Tomorrow he would be gone for thirty-one days. Singapore, then London, then Dubai. The longest trip since he put that seven-carat diamond on my finger. I should have been relieved. Instead I felt hollow.

Morning light poured through the floor-to-ceiling windows when I finally came downstairs. I’d chosen a simple cream silk robe, cinched tight, hair still damp and loose down my back. Smelled like oranges and the ridiculous French shampoo Victor shipped in by the crate.

Victor was already at the table, phone in one hand, coffee in the other, tie perfect as always. And across from him sat Ethan.

My stepson.

He had his back to me at first, broad shoulders filling out a plain black T-shirt, one arm stretched along the back of the chair beside him like he owned the place. Which, technically, he kind of did one day. His dark hair was still messy from sleep, and when he turned the page of whatever he was reading on his tablet, the movement made the muscles in his forearm flex.

I hated that I noticed.

“Morning,” I said softly, forcing a smile.

Victor stood immediately, crossed the room, and kissed my cheek. “There’s my gorgeous girl. Did you sleep well?”

Liar, I thought. You were snoring five minutes after you finished.

“Like a dream,” I answered, letting him guide me to my chair. The one right next to Ethan.

Ethan didn’t look up. Just took a slow sip of his coffee, eyes on the screen.

Victor was already checking his watch. “Driver’s outside. Flight’s at eleven.” He squeezed my shoulder. “Ethan will be around if you need anything, won’t you, son?”

Silence.

I glanced sideways. Ethan’s jaw was tight, lips pressed into a line that could cut glass. He set the mug down with a deliberate click.

“Ethan,” Victor repeated, sharper this time.

Finally those ice-blue eyes lifted. They flicked to his father, then to me, lingered half a second too long, and returned to Victor. “I’m not a babysitting service.”

Victor sighed the way he did when a deal wasn’t going his way. “She’s your stepmother.”

“She’s thirty-four,” Ethan said flatly. “Pretty sure she can pour her own wine without supervision.”

Heat rushed to my cheeks. I opened my mouth to smooth things over, but Victor’s phone buzzed and the moment shattered.

“I don’t have time for this.” He kissed me again, quicker this time, right at the corner of my mouth. “I love you. Call me any time, day or night. And maybe,” his voice dropped, playful, “maybe miss me a little?”

I smiled the smile that had landed me on the cover of Vogue twice. “Always. Safe flight.”

And then he was gone. The front door shut with a soft, expensive thunk, and the penthouse fell quiet except for the hum of the city thirty floors below.

Ethan drained the last of his coffee, stood, and started to leave without a word.

“Ethan.”

He paused in the doorway but didn’t turn.

I don’t know what made me say it. Maybe the frustration still coiled in my stomach from last night. Maybe the way he’d looked at me for that half-second, like he saw straight through the silk and the smile and the lie.

“You don’t have to like me,” I said quietly. “But you don’t have to be cruel either.”

For a moment I thought he’d keep walking. Then he glanced back over his shoulder, and something in his expression made my breath catch. Not cold. Not anymore. Something darker. Hungrier.

“Cruel?” His voice was low, rough from sleep. “You have no idea.”

He left me standing there, pulse racing for reasons I didn’t want to name.

I spent the rest of the morning trying to shake it off. Yoga on the terrace. A green juice I didn’t taste. Three episodes of some show about rich people cheating on each other, ironic enough to make me laugh once.

By two o’clock the silence was deafening.

I wandered past Ethan’s wing of the penthouse, telling myself I was just checking if he’d eaten lunch. His door was cracked open. Music leaked out, something with a slow, heavy bass that vibrated through the floor.

I should have kept walking.

I pushed the door wider.

He was shirtless, doing push-ups in the middle of the room, earbuds in, sweat glistening on the ridges of his back. The movement was fluid, powerful, relentless. One-handed now, because of course he could. Each rep made the muscles in his arms and shoulders flex in ways that should be illegal.

He sensed me, I swear he did, because he stopped mid-rep, looked up, and pulled the earbuds out slowly.

I couldn’t move.

His chest rose and fell, slick and perfect. A thin line of hair disappeared beneath the waistband of low-slung gray sweatpants. When he stood, all six-foot-three of him, the room felt suddenly too small.

“Need something, Amelia?” The way he said my name wasn’t respectful. It was a dare.

I swallowed. “I, just checking if you wanted lunch. There’s salmon.”

His mouth curved, not quite a smile. “I’m not hungry.” His gaze dropped, deliberate, from my eyes to my mouth to the V of my robe where my skin still carried the faint pink from this morning’s shower. “Not for salmon.”

My nipples tightened so fast it hurt. I crossed my arms, which only pressed the silk tighter against my breasts. His eyes tracked the movement.

Jesus. Get out, Amelia.

I turned to go.

“Thirty-one days,” he said behind me, voice like smoke. “That’s a long time for a woman who didn’t come last night.”

I froze.

He couldn’t know that. Could he?

Slowly, so slowly, I looked back. He hadn’t moved, but the air between us crackled.

“Careful, stepmom,” he murmured. “Some doors you open, you don’t get to close again.”

Then he stepped forward, reached past me, and pulled his door shut in my face.

I stood there for a full minute, heart hammering against my ribs, thighs pressed together so hard I trembled.

Thirty-one days.

God help me, I was already counting.