All Chapters of The taste Of Revenge: Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

SELENE'S POV I wake up in Damian's penthouse, still fully dressed, the sunlight streaming through the windows. It's late afternoon, maybe early evening. I wonder how long I've been asleep. Damian enters the room with two cups of coffee, looking all casual in sweatpants and a t-shirt. He sits on the edge of the bed and hands me a cup, asking how I feel. I take a sip of the coffee he prepared, and it's just the way I like it. Xavier never really made coffee for me despite knowing how much I loved it. “It's nice… the coffee.” I admit. "What time is it?" "Six-thirty," Damian responds. "PM?" I clarify and he nods in agreement. Panic washes over me as I remember the medical board hearing is tomorrow and I haven't prepared for it in the slightest bit. “ Babe… the medical hearing is in two days from now…jeez. Hoydif I forget?” Damian's usual composed demeanor cracks “Wait… what! Fuck I'm sorry…it… I'm sorry, I just didn't think it was this close all this while.” He says as he curse

Dr. Albright's gaze moves to Rubi the way a scalpel moves to skin. So precise, unhurried, certain of what it's about to open."Ms. Martinez. You were the primary surgical assistant during Mrs. Linda Harrison's procedure on September 14th. Is that correct?"Rubi's hands are flat on the table. I can see them trembling and struggling to stay still.Those same hands…they held a retractor for six hours once without a single tremor. Passed instruments into my palm before I could even ask for them, the two of us moving through a surgical suite the way people move when they've learned each other's rhythms so completely that language becomes unnecessary. Eleven years of that. Eleven years of standing shoulder to shoulder under lights that bleached everything white and made the world outside the operating room feel very far away…hands that patted my back when things went south.Those same hands are the ones trembling now. To others, or even perhaps to herself, it's barely visible, but definitel

The car pulls up. The engine cuts and I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding all along. Damian doesn't say anything. He hasn't said anything since I almost crashed out and honestly I'm grateful because I don't think I can handle his voice right now. Not that voice, not the one that stays so infuriatingly level when everything inside me is anything but.His door opens. Mine opens a second later and the night air is cold and immediate against my face. I step out. My heels hit the pavement and I look up at the building without meaning to. All glass, all light, stretching up into a sky I can't see the end of.It's beautiful and honestly, I hate that it's beautiful.Damian appears at my side. He's not touching my hands, but close enough that I'm aware of every inch between us."Selene." Just my name. Not the usual Lin he calls me when he wants to click something in me, no questions, no careful reassurance… Just my name in his mouth like it means nothing.I pull my blazer tighter

The hearing room hasn't changed overnight, though I half expected it to have grown teeth in the hours since we left, transformed into something more honest about what it really is—a place where they dissect you slowly enough that you feel every cut, a sterilized torture chamber dressed up in mahogany and professional courtesy. I remember being nine years old, standing outside the doors of my school's assembly hall in a dress my mother ironed twice, convinced I was going to be sick on my shoes. The debate was on water conservation. I had practiced for three weeks and I knew every word but my legs had forgotten all of them. Dad crouched down in front of me and took both my hands in his big warm ones and waited until I looked at him.“Find the table,” he said. “When your mind goes, find something solid. Press your hands into it and just feel it push back. He squeezed my fingers. Anything that pushes back means you're still here. And if you're still here, you're still in it. You're my cu

"What happens now?" I ask after a moment. "I mean…with Aurora?""Criminal investigation, federal charges probably for conspiracy, fraud, obstruction of justice." Damian's voice is matter of fact, like he's discussing the weather with me. "She'll surely be arrested.’ "And Rubi?""Uhm…Rubi…that's all up to you." I blink twice in sudden surprise "What?""She committed fraud, she sold medical records and accepted a bribe." He ticks off each crime on his fingers "But she also came forward to confess. She provided evidence against Aurora." He pauses. "If you want to press charges, I'll make sure she faces consequences, and if you don't, I'll make sure she doesn't.""Just like that?""Yes Lin, just like that." His eyes are steady on mine. "Your choice, babe." And there it is, that thing he does where he gives me power with his words even when I feel powerless, where he puts the decision in my hands and trusts me to make it. He has so much courage in me and I don't even know why… It's intox