{ETHAN POV}Three days have passed since Maya’s trip to Portland, and something has shifted.She came back different. Quieter, maybe. More thoughtful. For the first day, I was terrified she’d figured something out, that her mother had told her everything. But then she showed up at our usual coffee shop, smiled at me like nothing had changed, and asked about the new project timeline.No questions about my past. No suspicious looks. No interrogations.Just Maya, settling back into the rhythm we’d built together.Whatever she learned in Portland, whatever she was searching for, she seems to have let it go.I should be relieved. Instead, I’m terrified that I’m running out of time.“You’re doing it again,” Maya says, pulling me from my thoughts.We’re in her apartment—our first time here together outside of work emergencies. She invited me over for dinner, said she wanted to cook for me as a thank you for the planetarium date. I offered to help, but she banished me to the couch with a glas
Last Updated : 2026-02-10 Read more