All Chapters of The night everything changed : Chapter 11 - Chapter 17

Jess POV The next day at work, I did everything humanly possible to avoid him. I kept my head down, stayed glued to my computer, and prayed that if I moved quietly enough, fate would forget to place Dominic Doaz in my path.Emails only.No meetings.No eye contact.No air shared if I could help it.I focused on developing new ideas for the software project—one of the few things that brought me joy besides Liam—and tried to pretend that my entire life wasn’t hanging by a thread.After a while, I needed coffee. Badly. And I had a stack of paperwork that needed to be copied, reviewed, and sent to Dominic for signing before it went out to a new business partner. So I got up, grabbed the files, and headed toward the printer.The hallway was quiet except for the rhythmic clink, clink, clink of the copy machine.Then I heard heels.Sharp. Confident. Expensive.When I turned my head, all I saw were impossibly long legs and black stilettos strutting down the hallway like she was walking a run

Dominic POV I stepped into the elevator, not expecting her to be there.Jess.She flinched the second she saw me. Her eyes snapped to the doors like she could force them to open faster. She didn’t look at me. Not once. Not all damn day.Emails instead of coming to my office.Taking different hallways.Walking around the building like I carried a disease.Normally, I wouldn’t care.But this is Jess.The woman I’ve been thinking about for three years — the woman I never forgot. The one who slipped away before I even knew her name.And I’ll be damned if I let her slip through my hands again.I moved closer, closing the distance between us. Leaned in just enough for my breath to brush her ear and let my voice drop into something low and deliberate.“Jess… I need you.”I felt her tense.“You felt it yesterday. Don’t pretend you didn’t.”The air between us tightened instantly.I could hear her heartbeat pick up, feel the way she was trying desperately to stay in control. Her cheeks flushed

Jess POV I woke up feeling… wrong.Not tired. Not hungover. Not stressed.Just wrong.A heavy, dragging feeling weighed me down like my bones were glued to the mattress. My head throbbed, my stomach twisted, and my mouth was dry like sandpaper.“What the hell?” I muttered, pressing my palm to my forehead.I hadn’t eaten anything weird.Didn’t drink last night.Didn’t do anything except stress over—ugh—Dominic Diaz.I groaned.“Great. I’m allergic to him. That must be it. One look at that man and my whole immune system collapses.”I tried to sit up, but a wave of dizziness slapped me so hard I fell right back into the pillows.Jesus.I rubbed my face and turned toward the alarm clock.And froze.“OH, HELL NO!”I shot up like someone set me on fire. The clock was basically screaming at me — I was late. Not just late. Late late.“LIAM!” I yelled, sprinting down the hallway like a madwoman.But instead of chaos, I found him standing in the living room, fully dressed, curls bouncing, lunc

Dominic POV The car rolled up to the airport and Leo stepped out first. John was already standing there, casual, hands in his pockets like he had all the time in the damn world. Leo opened the door, and John slid inside.And of course—Hayley pounced.“Hi, I’m Hayley,” she purred, leaning in so far she was practically sitting in his lap.Good God.I bit back the urge to tell her to sit her ass down. The woman had zero self-respect. She flashed him some playful smile, twirled her hair, touched his arm…I rubbed a hand over my jaw, irritation burning through me.Pathetic.This was the person they expected me to marry?A walking embarrassment?I’d sooner let the Diaz bloodline die out than tie myself to someone this desperate.By the time we reached my place, I’d had enough stupidity for one day.“Leo, take Hayley home,” I said, already stepping out.She shot up straight.“What? No! I’m staying. I want to stay with you—”I didn’t even look back.“You’re going home.”My voice left no roo