Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 171 - Chapitre 180

★。＼｜／。★VANESSA DAVIS★。／｜＼。★By the time I finally said goodbye to my family, the sky was an inky shade of blue, the stars barely peeking through the haze of city lights. I hadn’t even stood up from the couch before Benny grabbed onto me like a koala and begged—pleaded—to come home with me.“Stay with me, Aunty Nessa! I wanna come!” he whined, tiny arms locked around my neck like a vice. “Please! I promise I’ll be good. I promise I won’t jump on the bed! I’ll just cuddle you like a pillow, I promise!” i think they’ve started giving him coffee, what happened to the sweet boy from months ago? I bet it’s due to the fact that he’s on holiday. And ezra must have been spoiling him to distract benny from the sudden absence of his mother.Lionel chuckled from the armchair, shaking his head. “You’re gonna give in.”Ezra didn’t even bother trying to convince Benny to stay. He rubbed his temples and muttered something about how he’d been trying to get Benny to sleep in his own bed for two night

★。＼｜／。★VANESSA DAVIS★。／｜＼。★Two months. That’s how long it took to clear Colton’s name from the mess Alina dragged him into. It sounds quick when I say it like that—“two months”—but every day felt like a war. Between legal teams, angry stakeholders, social media mobs, and all the behind-the-scenes maneuvering, it was a miracle we got him out with even a scrap of dignity intact. Colton's name is officially clean. His record is spotless as it should be. His reputation, slowly but surely, is healing. But in dusty creek his rep is fine. Alina? She’s still in the thick of it. Court cases don’t move with the kind of speed people imagine. It’s slow and tangled and endlessly frustrating. But that’s no longer my burden. I did my part. I saw it through. And now, my hands are off it.And also, the cure has been made and distrubuted and an announcement was made to explain to people the chemical and toxin, so they can be wary and so pharmaceutical comapanies can make medicine that will do very li

★。＼｜／。★VANESSA DAVIS★。／｜＼。★Colton really missed me.I could feel it in the way he held me, like I might disappear if he loosened his grip even a little. The way his arms wrapped around me, firm and protective, like he could absorb all the time we’d lost through touch alone. And then there was the kiss—God, that kiss.It took everything in me to pull away from it. No, I’m being honest. It took a lot for me to pull back from his kiss. I wanted him just as much as he wanted me. He kissed me once and then again just because he could.His mouth had been warm and hungry on mine, lips brushing, pressing, deepening in that slow-burning, desperate way that set my whole body on fire. The kind of kiss that doesn’t just say “I love you,” but screams, ‘Where the hell have you been?’ The kind that sinks into your bones, ruins you for all the kisses that came before it.I didn’t want to stop. I never wanted to stop. But I had to.Because as perfect as this moment was, there was something I needed

★。＼｜／。★VANESSA DAVIS★。／｜＼。★There are a lot of changes I’ve had to make since moving here. I’ve had to try things with animals... not in a gross way... actually yeah, in a gross way. Have you seen a horse give birth right next to you? That is horrifying. Milking cows... not horrifying but not fun either. The animals are usually the best and worst thing about being on the farm. But that isn’t the only big change I’ve had to make. I’ve also had to deal with certain views that I was sure I strongly stood on—only to realize life has a way of challenging even your most unshakable beliefs. One of those views is on marriage and what i thought was a devastating trap no one could escape from. I thought it would always lead to cheating, but when you’re with someone like colton.... well you start to feel like being Mrs Hayes.... isn’t the worst thing in the world. He loves too hard, it’s got me convinced.I never pictured myself as the kind of woman who’d type “wolf wedding traditions” int

▄︻デ══━一 COLTON HAYES💥 Dinner was ready by the time i finally psyched myself up to go into the house. Vanessa had introduced my family to hers and vice versa. I don’t want to point out how that’s not a good look for me. Why did i spend so much time outside trying to give myself a pep talk?The turkey had been carved, the casseroles browned to perfection, and Catia’s pecan pie—which she’d sworn three times wasn’t “that good” and then spent an hour fussing over—sat like a crown jewel at the center of the dessert spread. Everything smelled like tradition: cinnamon, brown sugar, roasted meat, and warm bread.It smelled like our tradition and i was happy the Davis’s are getting to experience it.But I couldn’t taste a damn thing. Not yet. Not until I got through the first fifteen minutes of this dinner without doing something dumb like dropping a gravy boat or calling her dad “sir” one too many times. The latter I’m pretty sure is the more likely thing to happen.The long table I’d spent