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Aftermath

Author: Ravenna
last update publish date: 2026-06-02 22:36:35

The penthouse felt different when you weren't pretending it was just a temporary place to avoid thinking.

Matthew sat on the edge of the bed—Victoria's bed, still smelling like her perfume and his own failure—and stared at his phone. The screen was dark. He'd turned it off about an hour ago because Victoria kept calling, and he didn't have the energy to answer the same question in different ways.

He had slept maybe two hours. The whiskey had worn off around 4 AM, which meant he'd spent the last
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  • One Year With Mr.Kingland   The Weeding

    The mansion gardens had been transformed without becoming unrecognizable.Simple white flowers hung from strings between trees. Chairs arranged in two sections facing a stone arch. No stage, no grand performance space. Just a place where two people could stand and say things they actually meant.Selena was getting ready in the guest house, and her mother was helping her into a dress that wasn't designed to impress the world—it was designed to make her feel beautiful.It was simple. Elegant. Ivory lace over silk, not too much, not too little. Just enough."You're radiant," her mother said, straightening the small veil that hung from Selena's curls."I'm nervous," Selena admitted."Good," her mother replied. "That means you know what you're doing matters."---Matthew was in the main house, getting dressed with Reginald.His grandfather stood in the doorway, watching him button his shirt."You look terrified," Reginald observed."I am terrified," Matthew admitted. "But in the right way.

  • One Year With Mr.Kingland   Recovery And Reconstruction

    The guest house bedroom faced east, so morning light came early and soft.Selena woke to Matthew sitting in the chair beside her bed, coffee in his hand, watching her like he'd been there for a while. Not in a creepy way. Just... present. Like he was making sure she was still alive."How long have you been sitting there?" she asked, her voice rough from sleep."Since five," he said simply. "Couldn't sleep."That had become normal over the past three days since bringing her home from the hospital. He'd set up the guest house as her recovery space—close enough to the main mansion for convenience, but separate enough that it felt like their space. Not his space that she was borrowing."Come back to bed," Selena said, and it was both a request and permission.Matthew set down his coffee and carefully climbed in beside her, mindful of her fractured collarbone and bruised ribs. She curled into him with her good arm, her head resting on his chest."This is nice," she murmured."Yeah," Matthe

  • One Year With Mr.Kingland   Accident

    The call came at 3:47 PM on a Wednesday.Matthew was in a meeting with the board of directors, reviewing quarterly projections, when his phone buzzed. He ignored it. Then it buzzed again. And again.Something in his chest registered: that wasn't normal.He excused himself and stepped into the hallway, looking at the screen.Richard Thompson, his attorney. Then Margaret. Then an unknown number. Then Richard again.His stomach dropped.Matthew answered before the phone finished ringing."Mr. Kingland, there's been an accident. Your wife—" Richard's voice was controlled but tight with something underneath. "She was hit by a car near the Riviera construction site. She's at St. Catherine's Hospital. You need to get there now."The world went very still."How bad?" Matthew heard his own voice from very far away."I don't know the details. They're running tests. But she was conscious when the ambulance arrived."Matthew didn't remember hanging up the phone. Didn't remember leaving the confer

  • One Year With Mr.Kingland   The Count Down

    Selena had a calendar hidden in her studio.Matthew found it by accident when looking for a pen—a small wall calendar tucked behind a design board, marked with careful X's through each day. He counted them automatically: seven months worth of X's, marking the days until freedom.210 days remaining.He'd stood there staring at those marks like they were personal indictments. She was counting. Actually counting down the moments until she could leave him.He shouldn't have looked. Shouldn't have invaded her space like that. But knowing made it worse than not knowing, because now he understood with absolute clarity: this wasn't just a rough patch. This wasn't something time would fix. She had already decided. Already planned. Already mentally left.---Matthew tried everything over the next week.He complimented her work: "The Riviera designs are genuinely brilliant."Selena: "Thank you." Nothing more. Polite distance.He attempted vulnerability: "I know I hurt you. I'm trying to understa

  • One Year With Mr.Kingland   One On One

    Matthew understood it while watching her work.She was in the studio late—past midnight—sketching preliminary designs for a residential project. The light from the desk lamp caught her face at an angle that made her look like someone he didn't know. Someone capable. Someone complete.And he realized: he was in love with her.Not the way he'd been in love with the idea of her when she'd first signed the contract. Not the possessive jealousy of watching her with Alexander. This was something else entirely. Something that wanted nothing from her except for her to keep becoming whoever she was becoming.He watched for maybe five minutes. She didn't notice him. She was too absorbed in the work—making tiny adjustments to a sight line, erasing something, redrawing it. Her fingers moved with confidence. Her expression was focused and peaceful.And Matthew felt something crack open inside his chest.This was what he'd destroyed. Not a person who needed him. A person who was extraordinary, and

  • One Year With Mr.Kingland   Unexpected

    For the next twenty minutes, they moved through the exhibition together, stopping occasionally in front of scale models, blueprints, and glossy renderings of buildings that would probably never look as perfect in reality as they did under museum lighting.Selena found herself watching Alexander almost as much as the displays.He paid attention.Not in the performative way people often did when they wanted to seem intelligent. He genuinely looked at things. Considered them. Asked questions.Most people only waited for their turn to speak.“What do you think?” he asked, nodding toward a sprawling model of a luxury hotel designed around a central courtyard.“It’s beautiful,” Selena said.Alexander raised an eyebrow.“Which means you hate it.”“I didn’t say that.”“You didn’t have to.”She smirked.“The courtyard is wrong.”“Wrong?”“It looks impressive from above. Great for photographs. Great for investors. But nobody thought about what it would feel like to actually spend time there.”A

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