FAZER LOGINEvelyn
Kendall got me home, and I barely made it through the door before the nausea came back. I dropped my bag beside the sofa and sat down quickly, bending forward with my head between my knees until the feeling passed. Kendall went into the kitchen and came back with a bowl and a glass of water, but I never needed the bowl. I took the glass from her, managed a few small sips and put it on the table. She sat down on the floor in front of me and rested one hand against my shin.EvelynI had scraped the same canvas twice by the time Damien came into the back room to tell me he was leaving for the hospital. The painting had started with a simple arrangement of colours, but I had spent the morning changing them without knowing what I wanted the finished piece to look like. Every time I picked up my brush, I remembered Adrian sitting in the courtroom while the judge delivered his verdict. Now he was in prison, and the court had sentenced him to years of his life that he would never get back. I could barely bring myself to imagine what that meant for him, yet I had accepted Damien's proposal and allowed everyone around me to believe I was ready to move forward.Damien stopped beside the table and looked at the canvas, his expression softening when he noticed the scraped patches. "You've been working on this for hours, haven't you? You told me yesterday that you were beginning to enjoy painting again, but you seem to be fighting with
Evelyn"Then Doris came into the room while I was helping him move to another chair," I continued. "She accused me of trying to take advantage of his recovery and using my position in the house to get him back. Adrian stopped her before she could say anything more, and he told her plainly that he still loved me. He said he would not allow the service order to be used to humiliate me, and he refused to let her speak about me as though I were someone he had hired to clean his house. I had spent months expecting him to remain silent while other people attacked me, and hearing him defend me was something I had not prepared myself for." Kendall looked down at the table and shook her head. "I can understand why that affected you, but I also remember what happened before then. Adrian was responsible for a great deal of your pain, and one moment of defending you does not erase the years you spent suffering in that marriage." "He did acknowledge it," I replied. "
DorisEvelyn's name made the gaps harder to dismiss. Her medical history had been discussed during the legal disputes surrounding her marriage, and some of the documents were included in the financial records connected to the old Parker-Marcello agreement.The clinic letters referred to procedures and follow-up appointments, but the costs recorded in the financial paperwork did not always match the number of procedures described.There were also references to a delayed test and a changed recommendation. I could not see who had authorized the change, and I did not know whether the difference in the costs came from a billing arrangement, an incomplete record, or something less ordinary.I opened another folder and found the court documents concerning Evelyn's six-month service obligation. They listed medical costs as part of the wider financial dispute, though they were not intended to provide a complete account of her treatment.I had no reason to assume the figures should match every
EvelynKendall came over while Damien was at the hospital, still overly excited about the previous evening. I had been sitting in the living room with my sketchbook open, trying to work out how I wanted to approach a new painting, but I closed it when she sat at the kitchen table and held out her hand to inspect my ring. She admired the design, turned my fingers slightly to catch the light, and then looked up at me with a serious expression. She couldn’t get enough of the ring. "It's a beautiful ring, Evie, and I was genuinely happy when Damien proposed. I wanted you to have a good evening, and I loved seeing you smile when he put it on your finger. But now that we've had a night to think about it, I need to ask you something, and I need you to answer honestly. Are you happy with Damien, or did you say yes because you're tired of everything you've been through?" Of course, Kendall… I didn’t need to say it but she had definit
DorisWith the company out of my grasp, my newest obsession had been getting Adrian out of prison. Yes, he had been such an asshole in throwing me out in front of that godforsaken Evelyn… But I still loved Adrian. I couldn’t be sure he had not killed Paul, but I knew Adrian well enough to know that irrespective of how bad he was, he was never a murderer. Someone else had killed Paul... And if Adrian was going to be free, someone had to take the fall for it. I had spent three evenings looking through the documents I collected after losing my position at the Parker company, and by Wednesday morning, I was beginning to understand why I had not been able to put the matter aside. The public judgment that had cleared Damien Cross was on my laptop, with the older reports from his arrest arranged beside it. I had printed the relevant pages and marked the dates in red ink. I was not a doctor or a lawyer, but I had spent yea
KendallI had missed Isaac more than I wanted to admit, and kissing him brought all those feelings back at once. Then I remembered where I was and pulled away. "Stop," I said, taking a step back and trying to steady my breathing. "We cannot keep doing this, Isaac. I shouldn't have kissed you, and you shouldn't have come here to ask me questions you already know I don't want to answer. Raymond has done nothing to deserve having me standing out here kissing another man. I have to stop this before I hurt someone who trusts me." Isaac looked at me, his jaw tightening. "You kissed me, Kendall. I didn't grab you or ask you to do anything you didn't want to do. You came over to me, you put your hand on me, and you kissed me. Kendall, you have to trust your feelings and follow your heart." "You know nothing about my feelings, Isaac" I replied, rubbing my hands together as I searched for the right words. "I'm angry with myself for allowing it







