登入分享
Chapter 51: Do Not Approach My Son
publish date:
2026-06-23 11:27:38
最新章節
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 51: Do Not Approach My Son
(Keyla POV) The break between the service and reception lasted fifteen minutes. Apparently that was all the time Draxler needed to find me. The fifteen minutes when the family dispersed to compose themselves and the guests drifted toward the tea and the awkward condolences, and I'd stepped away from Nora and Leo for exactly the length of time it took to find a bathroom and check that my face still looked like a face. Coming back, he was there. He'd chosen his position carefully. Close enough that I couldn't miss him. Far enough that no one could accuse him of stopping me. He was simply present in it, standing near the arrangement of funeral lilies that one of Eleanor's staff had placed on the side table, and when he saw me he didn't pretend he'd been heading somewhere else. "You have one minute," I said, before he could open with anything. Surprisingly, he didn't argue. Draxler held my gaze for a second. "How old is he?" I said, "That's not your question to ask." He exhaled on
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 50: Eleanor Notices
(Keyla POV) Eleanor Churchill looked at Leo once, across the width of the formal drawing room, and for the briefest second, the rest of the room seemed to disappear from her attention. Surprise would've been easier to read. Eleanor gave me something much harder than that. More like the expression of someone who has just encountered the look of someone who had just found the missing piece of a puzzle she hadn't admitted she was solving, and who is deciding how to handle it before anyone else in the room notices they've noticed. I noticed. I'd been watching for it since we'd arrived. I'd known this moment was coming when Eleanor's attention would find Leo and lock on. I'd hoped it wouldn't happen until after the legal meeting, maybe not until after the funeral itself. Eleanor had never been slow about anything that interested her. She crossed the room with the unhurried deliberateness of someone who owned the floor she was walking on, which she effectively did. Even in mourning, th
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 49: The Little Mirror
(Keyla POV) Leo came around the corner from the side hall with Nora's hand in his, and I reached for him before I meant to — My hand moved before I'd made the decision consciously, the move of someone securing something rather than greeting them, and Draxler was close enough to see it. Leo let me pull him in, but he was already looking past me. He'd spotted Draxler the way he spotted most things — quietly, without pointing, just a long assessment from the partial shelter of my side. I didn't look at Draxler. I kept my eyes on Leo and tried to think of a reason to move, to redirect, to put more floor between us and this moment.His eyes never left Draxler. "Mom." Leo's voice was low. "Who's that?"It was the safest answer I could think of. "Someone who lives here." I adjusted the strap of his backpack. "Don't stare." "I'm not staring. I'm looking." He said it like there was a meaningful distinction, judging by his expression, those were completely different activities.. He was stil
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 48: The Woman at the Funeral Door
(Draxler POV) I turned away from the corridor toward the main entrance, and she was standing there. Five years. I'd spent five years with a torn piece of wedding veil in a locked drawer and a woman I couldn't stop looking for, and now she was twelve feet away in the entrance hall of Blackthorn, wearing black, holding a funeral program, and looking at me with an expression that said she'd already calculated the exits. Marcus had been mid-sentence — something about timing, about the legal team arriving early — and he stopped. Whatever Marcus was saying disappeared into background noise. Keyla. Every photograph I'd collected suddenly felt useless. *Her.* Recognition arrived through the smallest things, something about the way she held her shoulders that I'd thought about more than I was ever going to admit to anyone. She looked like someone life had reshaped.. Different. Like someone who'd spent five years learning to take up less space and had become very good at it. She'd seen me
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 47: Blackthorn Manor Waits
(Keyla POV) The rain started somewhere around the last mile of private road, and by the time the gate came into view — iron, tall, the kind that seemed designed to remind you whose territory this was — the windows were streaked and the late afternoon light had gone flat and grey. Blackthorn Manor appeared through it like a fact rather than a building. Stone, old, four storeys with the kind of proportions that communicated money so far back it had stopped needing to be discussed. I'd been here twice before. Two visits had been enough to leave a mark. Adrian had insisted would go well and which had not. I'd stood at that same gate both times, on a sunny day the first time and a mild evening the second, and it had been unsettling without ever needing to announce itself. In the rain, in mourning black, it was something else. His nose was practically against the glass. "It's enormous," Leo said, face pressed to the glass. A second later: "Like in the book with the dragon." I didn'
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 46: Three Tickets Home
(Keyla POV) Leo never took his eyes off the window. "Are we going to meet the monsters or the family first?" Leo asked this with his face pressed against the airplane window, watching clouds slide past like he'd never seen any before, even though we'd flown twice for client work and he'd been bored both times. I looked up from the folder in my lap. "Neither." Leo finally glanced away from the clouds. "We're going to meet some lawyers." His disappointment was instant. "That's boring." On that point, we were in complete agreement. "Very." He seemed satisfied with this and went back to the window, his small backpack wedged between his feet — packed with exactly the things he'd insisted on: three toy cars, a picture book, and a stuffed rabbit that had lost one ear in a washing machine incident two years ago and never fully recovered. I'd checked his passport three times before we left the apartment. Every few hours I found myself reaching for it again, just to look at his photo
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 37: A Better Apartment
(Keyla POV) Leo ran into the room ahead of us and stopped in the middle of it. Nobody would've mistaken it for a large bedroom — small enough that the toy chest and the single bed we'd ordered would take up most of the floor space, the window looking out onto a courtyard rather than a wall, at le
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 36: The Old Man's Cough
(Augustus POV) He folded the handkerchief before anyone saw it. The movement had become automatic. By the time anyone looked his way, the handkerchief was already gone.. The sight no longer surprised him. Three months was long enough to stop calling it temporary, which was long enough that Augu
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 35: The Boy in the Addendum
(Keyla POV) I almost missed him. The entrance was rarely used unless someone wanted to avoid attention, the one that didn't bring you past the main reception room where Eleanor spent most of her mornings. The kind of briefcase that usually arrived attached to invoices nobody argued with. He alrea
One Night with My Ex-Fiancé’s Ruthless Brother Chapter 34: Augustus Writes a Name
(Augustus POV) "How difficult," Augustus said, "is it to protect a child that no one is allowed to know exists?" Nineteen years working for the Churchills had trained most visible reactions out of him.. "Money is one thing. Identity is another. Inheritance is a different fight entirely." "Eventu
你可能也喜歡
One Night With Mr Billionaire
Sun girl782.2K 閱讀量Addicted to Loving You: The Paranoid and Domineering Boss's Convicted Wife
Gu family's Little Bamboo688.5K 閱讀量Craving The Wrong Brother
Elysian Sparrow586.0K 閱讀量A Ruling Passion: Mr Tremont's Priceless Little Bride
Lemon Flavored Cat1.5M 閱讀量The wrong vow: I BECAME MY EX'S AUNT
Kennywrites 83 閱讀量One Year of Sin: A Forbidden Desire
Sommy Writes86 閱讀量Hearts of the Fallen Empire
El73 閱讀量Dripping Taboo: {Collection Of Forbidden Wet Desires}
Joyce Claire308 閱讀量
