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Chapter 96— THE AFTER
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2026-01-25 01:52:47
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WHICH MAN STAYS? Chapter 28 — THE SEAT TAKEN
ELLIE'S POVMy hands were still shaking when I picked up the phone again. The TV was off now, but Giselle’s face and words kept playing in my head like a bad song on repeat. I scrolled through my contacts until I found Daniel’s name. My thumb hovered over the call button for a second before I pressed it. I needed answers. I needed something— anything— to make sense of this mess.The line rang twice before he picked up.“Ellie,” he said, his voice flat and tired.“Daniel, we need to talk.”There was a long pause. Then he sighed. “I remember warning you— and begging you— to buy my share in Silhouette when I offered it. You ignored me. Now you’re calling?”I closed my eyes and leaned against the wall. Leo was still on the couch, watching me with worried eyes. I tried to keep my voice steady. “Daniel, let me admit it. That day, I was acting based on my emotions. I was angry. Hurt. I just want to understand now— why is Giselle on my TV screen saying the opposite of what you told me? You sa
WHICH MAN STAYS? Chapter 98— THE SEED
The third spring in Seabrook arrived not with a gentle thaw, but with a week of defiant, icy rain that finally gave way to a sun so bright it made the wet world glitter. In the mud of my resurrected garden, I found the first brave spear of a crocus pushing through. It was purple, a tiny, triumphant flag. I showed Leo, his small hands caked in mud, his laughter echoing in the crisp air.Life had settled into a rhythm that felt less like a recovery and more like a life. A simple one. The kind with grocery lists and parent-teacher conferences and debates about whether to get a dog. (Leo was pro-dog. Liam was pro-"let's finish the storage shed first." I was secretly pro-dog, but loved the debate.)Liam's work with the coastal board had led to a part-time consultant role with the state parks service. He used his old, ruthless analytical skills to untangle budgeting knots and permit logjams. He came home smelling of pine and bureaucracy, a combination that made him grin. He was using the ma
WHICH MAN STAYS? Chapter 97: THE BLUFF
The cottage on the bluff was less a wreck and more a skeleton. Wind and salt had scoured the cedar shingles to a silver-grey. Two windows were boarded up. The porch sagged like a tired smile. But the view—the view stole the breath from your lungs and the fear from your heart. It was an endless expanse of moody Pacific, broken by the dark, jagged teeth of sea stacks. It was violent and beautiful and utterly, magnificently indifferent.Leo stood between us, one small hand in each of ours, and stared. "The ocean is big," he declared, his voice full of awe."It is," Liam said, squeezing his hand. "And this is ours. To fix."We named it Driftwood House for the grey, weathered look it already had. The purchase, funded by the swift, anonymous sale of a certain cliffside property thousands of miles away, was quiet. James's architect friend, Ben, drew up simple, sturdy plans. The town, a place called Seabrook, asked no questions. They saw a family looking for a fresh start, and that was a stor
WHICH MAN STAYS? Chapter 96— THE AFTER
MAYA'S POVThe federal safe house was not a home. It was a beige, carpeted limbo. It smelled of stale air and industrial cleaner, a bland anonymity that was both a relief and a kind of mourning. There were no windows that could be seen through from the outside. The doors had three locks. It was the safest place we had ever been, and it felt like the inside of a sealed vault.Leo, after days of clingy silence, began to tentatively play with the toys a kindly marshal had brought. He built towers with blocks, his movements careful, as if loud noises might summon the monsters back. He didn’t ask about Clara. He didn’t ask about the cliff house. The silence around those subjects was a wall we all gratefully maintained.Liam spent hours on the phone with Aronson and a new battery of lawyers—federal lawyers, financial lawyers, lawyers who used words like "restraining order," "asset forfeiture," and "criminal conspiracy." Clara was not in jail. She was under house arrest at the Finch mansion,
WHICH MAN STAYS? Chapter 95— THE BREACH
LIAM'S POVTime seemed to fracture. The sterile, controlled space of the cliff house dissolved into a tableau of raw, exposed power. Clara, for the first time since I’d known her, looked not calculating, but cornered. The invisible walls of her influence had been rendered visible, and they were closing in, broadcast on a live stream.The two men in tactical gear who had brought us here appeared at the doorway to the deck, their hands raised. Behind them, silhouetted against the stormy sky, were figures in flak jackets emblazoned with “U.S. MARSHALS.” The drone’s eye view had been replaced by the very real, very armed eyes of the state.Clara’s gaze swept over them, then back to James, to Rachel, her mind working with a visible, almost physical intensity. She wasn't defeated. She was recalculating with catastrophic variables.“You think this ends with me in handcuffs?” Her voice was a low, venomous scrape. “You’ve documented a private conversation under extreme duress. You’ve trespasse
WHICH MAN STAYS? Chapter 94— THE CLIFFSIDE
MAYA'S POVThe house was a museum of silence. Floor-to-ceiling windows showcased a violent, beautiful seascape—grey waves slamming against black rocks far below. The wind howled around the glass box, but inside, the air was still and cool. It smelled of new money and emptiness.Clara stood in the center of the vast, open living area, a solitary figure in all that space. She didn't gesture for us to sit. This wasn't a social call."The flight was a predictable move," she said, her voice cutting through the roar of the distant surf. "Melodramatic. Inefficient."Leo clung to my leg, hiding his face in my jeans. I kept my hand on his head, a grounding touch for us both. "What do you want, Clara?" My voice was scraped raw from fear and the cold wind.She ignored me, her gaze on Liam. "You were liquidating assets. Preparing to disappear. You thought you could simply vanish from the world I helped you inhabit." A faint, icy smile. "There is no 'outside' for people like us, Liam. Only places
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