Chapter Eleven: The Long Road

Elara POVThe vehicle smelled of stale coffee and rain. Anne drove in perfect quiet, her hands firm on the wheel and her eyes constantly fixed on the road. She hasn't said anything since we left Haven House twenty minutes ago. Hadn't asked my name, hadn't given hers other than what Margaret told me, and hadn't even looked at me in the rearview mirror.I sat in the back seat gripping my suitcase, everything I possessed pressed against my chest like armor, and watched the dark landscape pass by. There are no streetlights out here. No houses. Just vast fields with occasional groups of trees, dark forms against a somewhat less black sky.My phone was still in pieces in the bag. Battery detached from the gadget, SIM card removed. As if taking it down would fix the error I had made.Two minutes. I had been on the phone with Adrian for two minutes.Long enough for him to hear my voice crack. Long enough for his detectives to locate a general area. Long enough to shatter the delicate peace I

Chapter Twelve: I RAPED MY WIFE

The rain hammered against the windows of Maya's flat, turning the London streets below into blurred streaks of light and shadow. She stood at the window with her third cup of coffee, staring at her phone like it might suddenly ring with news she desperately needed.Two weeks.Elara had been gone for two weeks, and all Maya had was one cryptic text message: ‘I'm safe. I'm sorry I couldn't tell you. I love you.’That was it. Nothing since. No calls. No updates. Just silence.Maya had tried calling Elara's number obsessively for the first three days thirty, forty times a day until it became clear the phone was off permanently. She'd gone to every place they used to go together: the coffee shop near Elara's old flat, the park where they'd studied for exams, the little bookshop Elara loved. Nothing.Her best friend had vanished like smoke.And meanwhile, Adrian bloody Kingsley was plastering his face across every news outlet, playing the concerned husband. Maya had watched his press confe

Chapter Thirteen: The Predator Circles

Nathan Kingsley sat in the corner booth of The Dorchester bar, swirling his third whisky and watching the entrance with predatory patience. The soft jazz playing overhead did nothing to calm the excitement thrumming through his veins. Opportunity. That's what Adrian's spectacular downfall represented. Pure, beautiful opportunity.He'd watched his cousin self-destruct over the past two weeks with a mixture of amusement and calculation. Adrian, the golden boy, the perfect heir, the one who could do no wrong in the eyes of the board, was finally showing cracks. Deep, irreparable cracks.His phone buzzed. A message from his contact at the PR firm.‘New developments. Call me.’Nathan smiled into his drink. He'd been paying Sophia Ward very well for information, and she hadn't disappointed yet. The woman was a shark, exactly the kind of person I was looking for.He stepped outside into the cold November evening and dialed."Tell me something good, Sophia.""Better than good." Her voice was

All Chapters of He wanted an heir, not a wife. : Chapter 11 - Chapter 13

Chapter Eleven: The Long Road

Chapter Twelve: I RAPED MY WIFE

Chapter Thirteen: The Predator Circles