Lahat ng Kabanata ng Love in Deceit: Kabanata 21 - Kabanata 30

She was soft again.That was the first thing Alexei noticed when Ayala looked at him across the café table. Her shoulders were no longer set like steel, her voice didn’t cut like glass. The fire was gone from her eyes—burnt out, maybe, or hidden under the ash of exhaustion.She’d forgiven him. Or maybe she hadn’t, not fully—but she was willing to forget for a little while. And that was enough.For now.He sipped his coffee slowly. He liked the smell of his coffee more than the taste; it provided more warmth than the taste. Ayala stared into her cup, stirring without purpose. She had done more than this; she had actually drank the coffee.“I’m glad you agreed to meet,” he said gently.She nodded but didn’t look up. “I didn’t say I agreed to forget.”“I wouldn’t ask you to.” He placed his cup down with deliberate slowness. “Only to give me a chance to make things right.”Ayala didn’t respond. She just pulled her purse to her and her coat across the other chair around her, her fingers sh

Ayala was different now. She wasn’t confronting me. That would’ve been easier. No, she was slipping again. We never slept in the same room again. She didn't return after she left.Over the next few days, I buried her under texts.“You’re not thinking clearly.”“Come home and talk to me.”“You promised we’d work through things.”“Don’t make me remind you what you owe me.”She didn’t reply.So I showed up at her job again.This time, the receptionist asked me to wait outside. Polite but firm. The tone of someone who’d been told very specifically that I was no longer welcome.When Ayala came out, she looked like a different woman.She wasn’t broken.She wasn’t defeated.She was done.“I’m asking you, Alexei,” she said, voice steady, “not to come here again.”My jaw tightened. “You’re overreacting.”“I’m setting boundaries.”“Quietly pulling away. Laughing less. Answering my questions in clipped tones are not boundaries, you are avoiding me”, I said whilst holding her wrist. I really did

I didn’t sleep much that night.I lay on the guest bed in Vladimir’s apartment, staring at the ceiling as my thoughts flooded my mind, I was full of regrets. The sheets were smooth, the room perfectly quiet, but voices in my head had speakers. They banged loud with questions, with memories, with guilt. I wished to be able to turn back the hands of time. I would have never gone for that gala.Alexei hadn’t screamed. He hadn’t begged either. He just looked at me as if I’d broken his heart. Like I was the one who’d betrayed him by asking the right questions. It wasn’t just the lipstick. It was the perfume on his jacket. The late nights. The sudden mood swings. The way he started holding his phone like it held dynamite. The calls he took in the other room. The temper switches the tantrums. I just couldn’t take it.I had wanted to believe his excuses. God, I had. I wanted to be wrong. But if I forgave the excuses, how would I forgive for the scars, the light bruises, the possessiveness?I

Vladimir — POVLiving with Ayala was hard, very hard. I had to muster all the self constraint I had to face her in the morning. She was the last thing on his mind before he slept and the first thing when he woke up.He tried to give her space because he knew she was still healing. He often heard the sound of her cry, it made his heart clench. It felt like making Alexie feel double of her pain. I opted for her not to go to work, but she refused and I decided not to push. Her reasons were nice.The first rumor hit on a Monday.“Secretary Moves Into Billionaire’s Penthouse: Vladimir Igor Playing House with Alexei’s Girl?”I’d read it at my desk, my jaw locked so tight it hurt to speak that entire morning. My executive assistant, Liana, had walked in holding a copy of the paper like it was a grenade with the pin already pulled.“You saw it?” she asked, one brow raised.“Throw it out.”I'm sure she had seen it, I wondered her reaction to it.She did see it. The image stayed in my mind—the

Ayala — POV (contd.)The doors to the elevator shut behind me, and I didn’t look back.I held my shoes in my hands and walked barefoot. I didn’t care that I’d left most of my belongings at both Alexie's and Vladimir's houses jointly, also half my dignity was divided at both their places. I was left with my phone charger, my credit card and a few clothes I managed to have packed plus some money in cash. I just walked. Fast. As if distance would drown out the weight of what Vladimir said—or didn’t say.I didn’t want to cry in the street. So I didn’t. I flagged down a cab, gave the name of a hotel I remembered from a work errand months ago—neutral, high-end, far enough to breathe—and kept my mouth shut the entire ride.The driver looked at me, with pity. I hated it.The reception was lightly lit and a scent that reminded me of work. The smell of my office. The office where I walked for him, Vladimir.I didn’t give my real name when I checked in. Just “Mara,” short for a character I used