Lahat ng Kabanata ng Switched at the Mafia Auction: Kabanata 191 - Kabanata 200

~ Avelyn ~I stood at the door, as if staying there would stop things from escalating more than it already has. I didn’t even know what I was doing here with his baby in my belly and a secret in my closet. Xander walked into the room, making himself comfortable by removing his cuffs. The simple act alone looked like something straight out of a corporate shirts commercial. I watched him uncork a bottle and pour into two glasses, I’m assuming the second one was for me. He always did this even though he knew I never drank. Maybe courtesy or whatever, I didn’t care. My mind was on something else. The letter that I have to pass to Stacy, once this was over. In that letter I agreed to Kyle’s arrangement but right now, I’m scared. Is running away with Xander’s child really my best option or my only option?“I realized something this past weeks,” My eyes snapped up to meet him. He was taking a sip casually, leaning against the counter and charging the atmosphere with his very presence. I

~ Avelyn ~I woke to silence.Not the peaceful kind. The kind that felt wrong.The digital clock on the nightstand glowed 3:07 a.m., its red numbers pulsing softly like a warning I didn’t understand yet. The sheets were still warm where he had been, the scent of him lingering clean, sharp, unmistakably Xander but the bed beside me was empty.I sat up slowly, my body aching in places that reminded me too vividly of what had happened only hours ago. My heart thudded once, hard, as I scanned the room.He just left his bed in the middle of the night. It wasn’t even morning yet. I told myself not to read into it. Men like Xander moved according to rhythms I didn’t understand. War didn’t pause because of intimacy. Power didn’t sleep.Still, unease crept in, curling tight around my ribs.I lay back down and closed my eyes, forcing myself to breathe evenly, to sink back into the mattress. It didn’t work. My thoughts wouldn’t slow, wouldn’t stop circling the same things.The letter.The one f

~ Avelyn ~I didn’t sleep.Not really.I lay curled on the edge of the bed in the guest wing they insisted on calling mine, staring at the wall while the image replayed over and over again, her body on the floor, the guards, the blood I hadn’t wanted to see but couldn’t unsee.You killed her.The words echoed inside my skull like a curse I couldn’t take back.My chest hurt as if something had lodged itself between my ribs and refused to move. Every breath felt borrowed and temporary.Stacy was dead.And I had walked away from the man crouched over her body like he was the executioner and the witness both.I pressed my palms to my eyes, but that only made it worse. Darkness gave the memory room to expand. The way Xander had looked up at me like the only mistake he made was not being able to control my arrival at the scene. Too calm and that was what terrified me.This was his world. Death wasn’t an event here, it was procedure. And I had been stupid enough to think I could exist besid

— Xander —I did not kill the maid.That truth sat heavy in my chest as I watched Avelyn strapped to the chair, fury blazing in her eyes like a blade she was desperate to wield.I had held dying men before. Had watched life drain out of them with indifference, sometimes relief. But that maid’s death was not my doing. Simply put, she brought it upon herself and yet the accusation still rang in my ears.‘You killed her.’The way she’d said it, not out of fear.But disgustLike she had finally seen me for who I really am.That look had followed me into this room and lodged itself beneath my skin. And maybe that was why I wanted her strapped to a chair like a criminal on trial. Maybe that’s exactly why we were here alone. I had not meant for this to turn into this.The interrogation was supposed to be simple. Controlled. I needed to know whether the infiltrator had succeeded in planting something, anything. Information, a device or a message, before she’d bitten down and robbed me of

~ Avelyn ~By the time I was escorted back to my room, my body felt hollow.Not weak, not tired.Hollow, like something essential had been scooped out and left behind somewhere between accusation and silence.I expected chaos when the door shut behind me.Broken things. Disarray. Evidence of a storm.Instead, the room was immaculate.The bed perfectly made. The curtains drawn at their precise angle. Not a single object out of place. Even the chair I’d abandoned in a rush earlier sat tucked neatly beneath the desk, obedient and still.I stared at it and then I laughed.It slipped out of me sharp and unsteady, too loud for the quiet. My hands flew to my mouth as if I could shove the sound back in, but it was already gone. The laugh didn’t carry humor. It carried hysteria.Of course the room was clean.As if nothing had happened.As if I hadn’t just watched a woman die on the floor.As if I hadn’t accused the most dangerous man I knew of murder to his face.As if my life wasn’t quie