Lahat ng Kabanata ng Until You: Kabanata 11 - Kabanata 20

🌿 Dan's Point of ViewMoney has a way of sharpening every conversation.It wasn't love, Lillie and I were counting on anymore. It was receipts.Rent. Groceries. Utilities. She insisted on buying the bottle of cheap wine twice a week because she couldn't live without "a little luxury." Every slip of paper became an accusation, every total a reminder of how far I'd fallen.I started keeping them all in a drawer, maybe out of habit, perhaps punishment. Thin white ghosts of my decisions. Sometimes, late at night, I'd pull them out and line them up by date, watching the numbers shrink. Not just my account balance, but what I was worth in her eyes.Lillie never looked at them twice. To her, money was oxygen. You didn't thank it; you just expected it to be there.I used to come home to a house where bills were paid on time and the fridge was full because Layla had thought ahead, planned, and cared. The house was immaculate, even though Layla was working. I'd taken it for granted. So much so

🌿Rider's Point of View Some moments don't need an audience. I'd built an empire on spectacle with press releases, galas, and launches. I'd asked my ex-wife to marry me under a chandelier, with cameras. The champagne had cost more than my first car. She'd smiled for the photographers before she'd smiled at me. Back then, I thought love needed proof. Now, I knew better. Love didn't need an audience, only presence. The right question asked in quiet meant more than any diamond paraded before a crowd. I used to mistake admiration for affection. Julia had loved the way I fit into her world. I was polished, predictable, and profitable. We'd looked perfect on paper. Two careers, two smiles, one headline-worthy marriage. But behind closed doors, our conversations were measured in transactions; in who hosted what, who impressed whom, and who was owed for each sacrifice. With Layla, silence was never a transaction. I didn't have to fill it with charm or cleverness. I could just… be. Maybe

🌿Rider's Point of View The first ripple came through my phone at dawn, waking me. Most mornings started the same way now. Quiet, steady, a ritual of order before the world demanded noise. I'd wake thinking of her before my feet hit the floor, a reflex I'd stopped trying to hide from myself. I still wasn't used to the word fiancée. Not because it scared me, but because it felt like it belonged to a different kind of man. A man who hadn't spent years turning everything into strategy. Layla had changed that. She'd changed me. The house still smelled faintly of her shampoo, jasmine, clean and warm, from when she'd stayed over two nights earlier. It made the quiet feel less empty, more like waiting. And so, this morning had started like any other, quiet, deliberate, the house still wrapped in dawn—the smell of coffee, the low hum of the espresso machine. I'd been halfway through my first sip when Mason's reflection appeared in the glass door. He wasn't a morning person; if he was her

🌿Rider's Point of View The day had been long, but productive. Meetings stacked on top of each other, ending with a board call that dragged past its usefulness. When I finally stepped into my office, all I wanted was quiet. The corridors were dim, lit by the low hum of emergency lights. Most of the staff had gone home hours ago, leaving only the faint scent of cleaning polish and burnt coffee. The city stretched beyond the glass, a restless grid of light and motion; alive in the way I wasn't. There was something oddly intimate about being the last man in a skyscraper, like standing inside a beast that had finally stopped breathing. For a moment, I closed my eyes and let the stillness settle. No voices, no noise, just the soft pulse of my heartbeat reminding me that beneath all the titles and deals, I was still a person trying to catch up to his own life. I thought of Layla; her laugh earlier that morning, the way her hand brushed mine in the kitchen. That thought grounded me more t

🌿Dan's Point of ViewI told myself I wasn't nervous.But standing outside our... no... Layla's house again after being away for months, my palms were damp, and my chest was tight. The hydrangeas along the porch were blooming like they always had, pale blue against the white rail. They hadn't changed.But everything else had.I parked two houses down, just like I used to when I was sneaking home late from work and didn't want to wake her. Some habits die hard. Others refuse to.The air smelled like wet earth and rosemary; she'd replanted the garden. I noticed the new fence, the brighter porch light, even the subtle difference in the curtains. Layla never did anything halfway. Every detail was intentional and controlled.I stood on the walkway too long, listening to the muffled hum of the city and the distant echo of waves. I used to think that sound was peaceful. Now it just made me feel small.My palms itched. My breath came shallow. I told myself I wasn't nervous, but I could already