LOGINI stopped in front of the mirror.It fit perfectly.The shoulders fell exactly where they should. The belt sat at the right point. The hem hit mid-thigh. Modest enough, indecent enough, enough to make me look like a mafia wife, well, maybe like Krystal, who had just taken control of the family resort after three elegant murders.I narrowed my eyes. “Interesting,” I muttered.I walked out of the bathroom, then noticed the walk-in closet door was slightly open.I shouldn’t have gone in.I really shouldn’t have.But I had already ruined my life once because of a computer that hadn’t been logged out. Apparently, I learned nothing. Or maybe I was simply the kind of woman who saw a secret door and immediately opened it while carrying fire and family problems.Sebastian’s walk-in closet, unsurprisingly, had never heard of the concept of enough.The left side was suits.A lot of suits.Black, navy, charcoal, several shades of gray that could only be distinguished by rich people and Daniella.
I don’t know when sleep came.Maybe after my body finally gave up before my brain did. Maybe after Sebastian stopped kissing the back of my shoulder, slow and warm. Maybe after I stopped counting all the reasons this was wrong and started counting the soft breaths against the back of my ear.What I do know is that when I finally went under, I went all the way.No dreams.No Adrian standing on the balcony with hurt in his eyes.No old systems, family trusts, security breaches, or the word “Romano” popping up in my head like a tax notification.Just warm darkness. A comfortable weight around my waist. Sebastian’s bare chest pressed to my back, his breathing slow and deep, his left hand spread over my stomach like he’d forgotten the human body couldn’t be considered private property just because you’d once missed it that much.I should not have felt that comfortable.I really shouldn’t have.But his arms locked the outside world away. His warmth spread from my back into my ribs, settling
I pull him down and kiss him again. That’s the last mistake that still has a chance to be taken back. After that, everything moves too fast and too slow at the same time. Sebastian lifts me without asking. One hand on my waist, the other under my ass, as if my body already knows the route to his arms. My legs automatically wrap around his waist. The kitchen marble vanishes. Dark hallways blur past the corner of my eye like a movie playing too fast. I don’t even remember when his bedroom door opens. I only remember the smell of his soap being stronger here, the scent of warm skin, and the sound of our breaths colliding. The bed meets my back. Soft. Expensive. Cold at first, then warming up fast as his body covers mine. Sebastian doesn’t rush. He props himself up on his elbows, knees pressing into the mattress between my thighs, and his mouth goes back to my neck as if he’s memorizing every inch that used to be his. “I missed you,” he whispers, his husky voice sticking to my skin.
Sebastian breathed softly against my mouth, as if he didn’t fully believe it until I pulled him closer.That should have been a very good moment to stop.Very mature. Very sane. Very I’m a thirty-year-old woman with a child, a career, and legal problems that might require their own dedicated binder.Sadly, my body had never read the memo.Sebastian kissed me again. Still controlled, because of course he was. Sebastian Romano could be burned alive and still look like he’d personally selected the kind of fire. But the pressure of his mouth changed, deeper, hungrier, more like something that had been locked in a dark room for a very long time and had finally found the door handle.My hands tightened around his shirt. The black fabric pulled between my fingers, warm from his body. I felt his stomach tense beneath my palm, and my entire head, which had been crowded with noise for days, suddenly went quiet.There was one small voice left in there. A voice wearing a black blazer, holding a c
Sebastian poured fresh batter into the frying pan, and it immediately spread into an uneven shape.I leaned my hip against the counter. “You used too much.”“I followed the recipe.”“The recipe didn’t tell you to pour your entire future into one pan.”“It says one ladle.”“Your ladle is huge.”He looked at the soup ladle in his hand.I raised an eyebrow. “That’s a catering weapon.”“Your kitchen tools aren’t labeled.”“This is your kitchen.”His gaze lifted to mine.Sebastian held my eyes for a few seconds, then looked back at the pancake. “Get the right ladle,” he said.I opened the second drawer on instinct.The smaller ladle was on the right, exactly where it had been in our old kitchen.My hand stopped inside the drawer.Of course he kept everything in the same place.Or maybe every expensive kitchen in the world was arranged by the same Swiss man who hated creativity.I took out the smaller ladle and set it on the counter. “This one.”Sebastian slid the bowl toward me. “Show me.”
I woke up because a small elbow slammed into my ribs.Poppy didn’t wake. She simply rolled over in her sleep, took up two-thirds of the bed, all of the blanket, and part of my dignity, then planted one chubby leg across my stomach as though I were an extra pillow purchased specifically for her.I opened my eyes.The star lights were still moving slowly across the ceiling. Blue, purple, white. Bunny was wedged beneath Poppy’s chin, one ear covering her nose. Her long hair was spread across the pillow and half her face, her bangs stuck to her forehead because she slept like she was negotiating with a small demon inside her dreams.I lifted her leg off me.She immediately put it back.“No,” I whispered.Poppy snorted.I moved it again, this time sliding a small pillow into place as a substitute victim. Her leg wrapped around it without protest.My mouth was dry. The warm water I’d had earlier hadn’t lasted long, probably because my body had used all of it to process guilt, dead digital s







