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Chapter 37: Instinct

作者: Ivy Rose
last update 公開日: 2026-07-18 21:27:56

POV: Damien

The quarterly review meeting ran forty minutes longer than it should have, which wasn’t unusual in itself. What was unusual was Whitfield.

He'd always been one of the more straightforward members of the board, not warm exactly, not someone I’d ever call a friend, but reliable in the way that mattered most in a boardroom, predictable in his positions, consistent in his concerns, easy to read because he never bothered trying to be anything else.

Today he was trying to be something els
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  • The Substitute Bride Of The Blackwood    Chapter 44: The Night He Stayed

    POV: CharlotteI heard him before I saw him.A sound from the corridor outside my room, not loud, not a crash, just something wrong in the quality of it, a single heavy contact with the wall that didn’t sound like someone walking past. I was out of bed before I’d finished deciding to move, my feet on the floor, the door open, and then I saw him.He was braced against the wall with one forearm, his other hand pressed flat to the surface beside him, his head dropped forward. Still standing. But only barely, and only because the wall was there.“Damien.”He didn’t answer right away. His shoulders were rising and falling too fast, his breathing audible in the quiet of the corridor, and the sound of it sent something cold rushing through me because I had never once heard him breathe like that, not in all the months of watching him carefully manage every sign that something was wrong.“I’m fine,” he said, to the wall.“You’re not,” I said.I crossed

  • The Substitute Bride Of The Blackwood    Chapter 43: The Dance

    POV: DamienI didn’t want to be here.That wasn’t new. I rarely wanted to be at events. What was new was that I’d known it before we even left the house, standing in the entrance hall watching Charlotte pull on her coat, and I’d understood that the reluctance had nothing to do with the event itself and everything to do with a feeling I hadn’t fully named yet and wasn’t sure I wanted to.I’d set it aside. I was good at setting things aside though I've been failing lately.The ballroom was everything these places always were, high ceilings, string quartet, the particular hum of three hundred people performing enjoyment at varying levels of sincerity. I’d moved through the first hour on the portion of my attention it required and kept the rest somewhere I wasn’t examining too closely.Charlotte was in green. She always reached for green when she wanted to feel settled rather than seen, I’d noticed that without meaning to, the same way I'd noticed most things ab

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  • The Substitute Bride Of The Blackwood    Chapter 41: The Charity Gala

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  • The Substitute Bride Of The Blackwood    Chapter 39: Watching and Waiting

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