ログインEvelyn~I realized I was in love with Leone because of a grocery list. Not a dramatic confession. Not some life-changing moment where music played in the background and everything suddenly became obvious. A grocery list. Which honestly felt unfair. People should get better stories than that. At the very least there should have been fireworks. Instead, I was standing in the kitchen staring at a piece of paper stuck to the refrigerator. That was it. That was the moment.The list was not even interesting. Milk. Eggs. Bread. Coffee. Orange juice. The normal boring things people bought every week. The thing that caught my attention was not what was on it. It was the handwriting. Half of it belonged to me. The other half belonged to Leone. And somehow that simple fact hit me harder than it should have. Because when had that started? When had we become people who shared grocery lists?I stood there staring long enough that Toby eventually wandered into the kitchen. He opened the refrigerator
Rebecca~The first hundred million was somehow the easiest to find. Which was an absolutely insane sentence.I stared at the screen for a full ten seconds after Nina said it. Then I looked at her. Then back at the screen. Then back at her again. “Did you just say the first hundred million?”Nina did not look up. “Yes.”“The first.”“Yes.”“The word first is doing a lot of damage to my mental health right now.”That finally got a smile out of her. Not a big one. Just enough to make me feel slightly less like I was losing my mind. Unfortunately, the numbers remained exactly the same. Which meant I was still losing my mind.The conference room looked like a war zone. Empty coffee cups. Printed financial reports. Three laptops. A whiteboard covered in arrows and notes. We had been here for almost sixteen hours. At some point during hour twelve, normal human behavior had abandoned us completely. Now we survived on caffeine and spite. Mostly spite.Nina zoomed in on another spreadsheet. “Lo
Nina~By the fourth day, I hated spreadsheets. Which was unfortunate because I was currently surrounded by them. Three monitors. Two laptops. Enough financial records to qualify as psychological warfare. And somewhere inside the middle of all that garbage was Samantha. Still hiding. Still running. Still causing problems.I rubbed my eyes and leaned back in my chair. The office was almost empty now. Most people had gone home hours ago. The city outside the windows had turned dark. The cleaning staff had already passed through once. Meanwhile I was still staring at numbers. Living the dream.A soft knock interrupted my thoughts. I looked up. Rebecca stood in the doorway holding two coffees. I immediately loved her. Possibly more than was healthy.“You remembered.”She handed one over. “You looked like you were considering murder.”“That is because I am.”Rebecca glanced at the screens. “Any progress?”I stared at the numbers. Then at her. Then back at the numbers. “No.” A pause. “Maybe.
Arthur~The knock came at six in the morning. Not a normal knock. Not the kind delivered by neighbors, friends, or delivery drivers. This one was sharp. Deliberate. The kind that immediately made your stomach tighten before your brain caught up.I was already awake. Sleep and I had not been getting along lately. So when the second knock came, I was standing before it finished.The moment I opened the door, I knew something was wrong. My lawyer stood outside. Still wearing yesterday’s suit. His tie was crooked. His eyes looked exhausted. And in twenty years of knowing him, I had learned one very important thing. He only looked like that when the situation was terrible. Not difficult. Not complicated. Terrible.I stepped aside. “What happened?”He entered without speaking. That answered the question immediately. Whatever it was, it was bad enough that he did not want to discuss it outside. Wonderful. Exactly how I wanted to start my morning.He dropped a folder onto the kitchen table. I
Evelyn~The house had finally gone quiet. Toby’s door sat cracked open like always, that soft blue nightlight spilling into the hall so I could hear if he had one of his bad dreams. I lay in bed with the sheet twisted around my legs, wearing nothing but that old oversized shirt that barely covered anything. My hair was still damp from the shower, sticking to my neck. The fan spun lazy circles above me but it did nothing for the heat crawling under my skin.Leone’s footsteps came up the stairs slow and deliberate. He paused right outside my door, one hand resting on the frame like he was giving both of us one last chance to pretend this was still just friendly tension. Our eyes met through the doorway and something in the air went thick. Heavy. The kind of heavy that had been building since the porch conversation about Arthur.“You’re thinking too loud again,” I whispered.He stepped inside and shut the door behind him with a soft click that felt final. “Been thinking since we stood ou
Evelyn~The sink chose violence at seven in the morning. I was halfway through making breakfast when the faucet made a horrible choking sound and blasted water directly across the kitchen.I yelped and jumped backward. The pan nearly hit the floor. Water sprayed everywhere. The counter. The cabinets. My shirt. The stupid fruit bowl. For a few seconds I just stood there getting attacked by plumbing because apparently life had decided Samantha was not enough stress.“What happened?” Toby appeared in the doorway.I pointed dramatically. “The sink has declared war.”He stared. The faucet continued spraying water across the room. “That is actually kind of impressive.”“Not helping.”“A little helping.”The water somehow got worse. I groaned. Then another voice appeared behind us. “Move.”Leone. Of course. The man had not even finished his coffee yet. He stepped into the kitchen, took one look at the disaster, and immediately disappeared under the sink.I watched him open cabinets, reach fo
POV: EvelynAfter planning for weeks, it was time to meet with the board and move the project along. I walked in without rushing and to my surprise, Arthur was already seated at the end of the table, posture stiff in a way that told me he was trying very hard to look like he still had control of s
POV: EvelynThe house was quiet when I stepped inside, I stood by the door with my hand still resting on the handle, letting my eyes move slowly across the familiar space.Nothing had changed.Everything was exactly where it had always been, from the polished floors to the carefully arranged furnit
POV: EvelynThe afternoon air felt thick as I stood by the road with my bag held tightly in my hand, and even though people were walking past me and cars kept moving like nothing was wrong, I couldn’t shake the strange feeling sitting in my chest, a quiet discomfort that refused to go away no matte
POV: EvelynLater in the afternoon,The air in the lawyer’s office was thick with the smell of expensive leather and old paper, and I sat across from Arthur while he stared at the document in front of him as if it were a death warrant rather than the freedom he had been begging for since Samantha







