All Chapters of THE PRICE OF LETTING GO: Chapter 141 - Chapter 148

Three weeks after the hospital, I woke up on a Tuesday and realized nothing was wrong.I lay there for a long moment, waiting for the familiar tightness in my chest, the old instinct that always checked for the next disaster before my feet even hit the floor. It did not come. Just morning light through the blinds, and the quiet, steady sound of Dominic moving around my kitchen, making coffee he had finally learned to make the way I actually liked it.I got up and found him at the counter, sleeves rolled, hair still messy from sleep, entirely unremarkable in the best possible way. He hadn’t heard me come in, and for a moment I just watched him, the easy, unhurried way he moved through my small kitchen now, like he’d finally stopped treating my space as something he was borrowing.“Morning,” he said, not looking up from the pour-over.“Morning.”He glanced at me then, something soft crossing his face. “You look surprised.”“I keep waiting for something to happen,” I admitted. “It’s been

Dominic read the email over my shoulder twice before either of us said anything, his breath warm and unsteady against my hair.“Call them now,” he said. “Tonight. Whatever this is, don’t let it sit until morning.”“It’s nearly ten,” I said. “Legal offices don’t answer at ten.”“Hargrove’s legal team works with three time zones. Someone will answer.”He was right. I dialed the number from the email, my finger slipping once on the screen before I got it right, and a tired-sounding paralegal picked up on the fourth ring.“This is Selene Whitmore,” I said. “I got an urgent email about a visa complication. I need to understand what’s happening.”“One moment.” Papers shuffled on the other end. “Yes. Ms. Whitmore. There’s a flag on your sponsorship application. Singapore’s labor board requires disclosure of any legal proceedings involving the sponsoring company within the last twelve months. Your file was cross-referenced against Hartley Industries due to the joint venture structure on the H

I did not sleep.I lay in the dark going through every possible version of what Foster’s message could mean, and by six in the morning I had convinced myself of at least four different disasters, none of which turned out to be true.I called her the second her office opened.“Selene,” she said, and I could hear the smile in her voice before she said another word. “I’m sorry for the scare last night. I should have worded that message better.”“You’re smiling,” I said. “Why are you smiling?”“Because the discrepancy resolved itself,” she said. “The reviewer who flagged your file originally left something out of her notes, a secondary reference check that came back late last night confirming everything in the timeline we submitted. Your freelance work, the nonprofit rebrand, all of it checked out clean. There’s no further action needed on your end.”I sat down hard on the edge of my bed.“That’s it,” I said. “It’s actually done.”“It’s actually done,” Foster said. “Your visa clears final

Six weeks in Singapore passed the way real time passes when you stop watching the clock for it.The Hargrove properties opened two weeks ahead of schedule, both of them, the local team throwing a small celebration on-site that ended with the head contractor, a stern woman named Mei who had tested me relentlessly for the first month, pulling me into a hug and telling me I’d earned the right to come back anytime I wanted, project or not.Dominic visited twice more during those six weeks, each trip shorter than the last, each goodbye a little easier, both of us slowly learning the specific rhythm of a life that could hold distance without breaking. On his second visit, he brought me a small potted plant for the apartment, something that could survive the humidity, he said, unlike the ones I kept accidentally killing back home.On my last night in Singapore, I stood on the balcony of the now fully furnished apartment, city lights spread out below me, and called my mother.“Tell me you’re