บททั้งหมดของ Before He Was My Boss.: บทที่ 81 - บทที่ 90

I straightened my skirt with shaking hands, tugging the hem down like it could somehow put me back together. The fabric felt wrong. Too tight. Like it remembered everything my skin still couldn’t forget. I arranged my shirt next. Fingers fumbling with the buttons. One, two, three. I missed a hole and had to start over. My breath hitched. Then I walked out the door. My knees were still very unsteady. It was like my legs had forgotten how to hold me. Like my bones had turned to jelly. I made it three steps before I collapsed into the chair immediately. My desk chair. It spun a little from the impact, and I gripped the armrests to stop the world from tilting. I brought my two hands to palm my face, letting out a shaky breath. It came out broken. Wet. My palms were cold against my cheeks, and I pressed hard, like I could push the last half hour back inside me. Like I could erase it. "Aurélie, what are you turning into?" I whispered into my hands. Then I laughed. It was a horr

My hand shot to the strap of my bag the moment I reached my desk. The leather was warm, worn soft from months of me gripping it too tight whenever Donovan walked into a room. I didn’t think about it. I just did it.I picked up my phone and checked that I had everything in place. His schedule was mostly empty now that the auction drew closer. Just mostly packed with meetings I had no business accompanying him to. Board calls with people whose names I didn’t know. Perfect.When I took my phone and bag, I hit Addison a flash as I headed for the elevator. My thumb moved faster than my conscience.“Hi, Addie,” I said when she picked up. My voice sounded too bright, like if I sounded normal, it would lessen my chances of getting caught.“Hi,” she said back. Just that and already I heard it. The edge. She was still mad. She had every right to be.“Are you home?”“Yeah, why?”“Well, I’m coming over to you right now.”“Okay? But aren’t you at work?”“I am. And I’m still coming. Byeeeee, love y

As we approached the parking lot of the tower, I saw him.Mr. Reynor stood in front of the SUV, hands clenched into fists at his sides, his eyes blazing in the dim light of the parking lot. Anger was carved into his face, sharp and ugly.He wasn’t the usual calm, composed, and organized person I knew him to be. He wasn’t still like a lifeless sculpture, calculating and cold. He was vibrating with it, trying to control his fury as he struggled to stay calm.Mike parked right beside the SUV, and the moment his shoes touched the ground, Donovan moved.Fast.Donovan lunged towards him, his fist crashing painfully into Mike’s nose. The sound was wet, ugly. Blood streamed down one nostril immediately as Mike staggered back, his hands flying up to his face to try and stop it.“No! Wait!” I screamed from the other side of the seat, my door flying open before I even began moving. I rounded the car to stop him, my heart in my throat.But two huge men dressed in black caught me before I could re

I still wasn’t allowed out of his house without supervision. Not even to the gate. Not even to breathe air that wasn’t filtered through his security team. He’d leave sometimes. For hours. To “prep for the auction,” he said. That was the word he used, like it was a business trip. Like I wasn’t part of the inventory he was protecting. I didn’t understand why someone who didn’t care would keep me caged like that. It should have made me angry. And it did. But underneath the anger, there was something else. Something softer and worse. It felt oddly comforting to know someone was watching the doors because of me. To know that when I slept, I wouldn’t wake up to a gun in a bathroom. But it still wasn’t enough. It was never going to be. So I toured the villa. Endlessly. Inside and out. Every room, every corner, every floor. It was magnificent. Dark and void. Marble that swallowed sound. Glass walls that looked out onto a garden I wasn’t allowed to walk in alone. The kind of ho

She wasn’t in her room.I knocked on three times, and waited before pushing through the door open when she didn’t answer. The bed was untouched, the lamp still on, her phone charging on the nightstand. My pulse ticked up a notch. The balcony on the top floor was next . The one she liked, the one that looked out over the pool. It was empty too. Just the wind and the dark and my own reflection in the glass, tense and unconvincing.Where the hell are you. “Aurélie.” I called.Then it hit me. The library.I was moving before I finished the thought.I found her standing on her toes, reaching for a book on the top shelf, and the sight of her stopped me dead in the doorway.She was wearing my shirt. Oversized, hanging loose off one shoulder, and the stretch of her reaching upward had pulled the hem high enough to show the soft curve of her ass, bare thighs catching the low library light.I felt it everywhere at once.She turned, sensing me there, and smiled like she hadn’t just wrecked my