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All Chapters of WHERE SIN FEELS LIKE HOME: Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

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Chapter 31

CHAPTER THIRTY ONE : Daughter's Friend~Zella's POV~The question hung in the room for exactly one second before I wanted to physically remove it from existence."Actually..." I said. "Never mind. That's not, I came to ask about the bathroom products."Evander looked at me."The products," I said. "In the bathroom. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to use them or if they were just there for..." I stopped. "Can I use them?"He looked at me for another second. Then something happened at the corner of his mouth.He smiled.Not the almost-smile. Not the corner-of-the-mouth movement. An actual smile, brief and warm, the kind that appeared occasionally and without warning and did something to the inside of my chest that I had absolutely no framework for managing."Everything in that flat is yours," he said. "Use whatever you want.""Why."The smile stayed. "Why else. Because I want you t

Chapter 32

CHAPTER THIRTY TWO : Trying ~Zella's POV~ I woke up and reached for my phone before I was fully conscious. Not for messages. Not for the time. Just — reached. The specific automatic reach of someone who had spent three weeks waking up in a penthouse where there was always coffee already made, footsteps in the kitchen and the low sound of another person existing nearby. There was nothing. Just the flat. Just Scotland. Just the particular quiet of a place that belonged to me and nobody else. I lay there for a moment and let that land. Then I got up. --- The microwave hummed. I stood in front of it watching the pasta container rotate and thought about the handwriting on the label that wasn't Evander's and the fact that he had organized someone else to write it and the fact that I was thinking about his handwriting at seven in t

Chapter 33

CHAPTER THIRTY THREE : One Dinner~Zella's POV~I woke up thinking about the invitation.Not obsessing. Not lying there with my heart doing things. Just... thinking. The way you think about something that should be simple and isn't quite.*Nice to meet you. The view from the east ridge is better than this one if you want to see it sometime.*Callum. Easy smile. Local knowledge. Nothing complicated about him. That was the point of him, apparently, nothing complicated. And yet here I was at seven in the morning turning it over like it required analysis.I got up. Made tea. Stood at the window with my hands around the mug.The penthouse lights next door were off.I looked at the hills instead.---Brynn called at nine like she had radar."Tell me everything," she said, before I'd finished saying hello."Good morning to you too.""Good morning. Tell me everything."I sat on the sofa. "There's nothing to tell.""You texted me last night that you met someone.""I met someone on a walk. A lo

Chapter 34

CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR : Come Meet Me~Zella's POV~I stood at the counter for longer than I should have.He had said *ah* and walked away and I kept turning the word over like it was something I could find a different meaning in if I looked at it long enough. One syllable. No inflection I could point to. No question attached. Just acknowledgment of information received, and then footsteps, and then a door.He could have asked who it was.He could have said something about Scotland being unfamiliar territory, about strangers, about any number of reasonable things an employer might say to a new member of staff going on a first date in a place she'd lived in for three days. He could have said something that wasn't claiming anything but gave me something to push against.He had said *ah.*I went to bed without texting Callum back.---I woke up at seven and looked at my phone.Callum's message from last night sat ther noe unanswered. *Still on for tomorrow?*I picked it up and typed before

Chapter 35

CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE : First Day~`Zella's POV~He opened the door before I knocked.Like he had heard me coming through the gate or had been watching from somewhere. He stepped back to let me in and I walked past him into the warmth of the main house and he closed the door behind us."Brynn called me," he said.I turned around. "What?""Twenty minutes ago." He crossed to the kitchen, unhurried. "She called to inform me that I was not to give you work materials over the weekend, that you needed time to settle before Monday and that she was holding me personally responsible for your stress levels."I stared at him. "She called you.""She called me." He put the kettle on. "She had quite a lot to say.""I told her you weren't the problem.""She disagreed." He looked at me over his shoulder. "She has strong opinions about how I run things.""She has strong opinions about everything."

Chapter 36

CHAPTER THIRTY SIX : Can I Really Do This~Zella's POV~"Sit down," he said.I sat. The room was quiet now, just the two of us and the morning light coming through the tall windows and whatever he had decided to say before things became officially professional.He didn't sit. He stood at the window the way he stood at windows, hands in his pockets, looking at something outside briefly before he turned back."I want you to feel free to ask me anything," he said. "About the role, the estate, the staff, the contractors, anything that will make the transition easier. Don't second-guess whether a question is too small. Ask.""Okay.""Sienna will cover the operational handover this week. But if something doesn't make sense or she's already left before you've understood it fully, come to me directly.""I will."He nodded. "You're going to be good at this."I looked at my hands briefly. "Thank you."He was quiet for a moment. Then ... "Did Brynn believe you?"I looked up. "About the dinner?"

Chapter 37

CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN : Tomatoes~Zella's POV~Turns out being Evander's estate manager meant seeing Evander constantly.I had not fully thought this through.Every file needed his sign-off. Every decision above a certain threshold went through him. Every contractor query that Sienna hadn't covered in the handover and there were several required a conversation with the man himself. By noon on my first day I had been in and out of his office three times and my face had been doing the tomato thing for approximately four hours straight.Sienna noticed on the fourth trip.She fell into step beside me in the corridor, file under her arm, reading something on her phone, and without looking up said... "Are you okay?""Fine." I kept walking."You go red every time you're about to go in there." She glanced at me sideways. "Cheeks, neck, the whole thing.""It's warm in this building.""It's January in Scotland.""I run hot."She stopped walking. I stopped too."Don't be scared of him," she sa

Chapter 38

Chapter 38: Belong~Zella Pov~I couldn't answer him.Not because I didn't know the truth. Because the truth was carved into my body from New Year's Eve, branded into my skin across a month in Paris, written into every breath I took around him.Yes. Always yes.His forehead was still against mine. His hand was still on my face, and I felt it, that familiar pull that had started in the London rain and hadn't stopped since, wouldn't stop, had become as essential to my body as blood."Zella," he said, his voice low. Patient. The voice of a man who already knew the answer and was simply waiting for me to admit what we both knew was true."We can't," I whispered. But my hands were already moving to his shirt, the same shirt I'd memorized in the dark of a penthouse, the same fabric I'd gripped in Paris while my body did things my mind couldn't process. "We said...""Say it again.""We can't." My fingers found buttons. "Sienna. The building. This is work and Brynn is...""Say it like you me

Chapter 39

Chapter 39: Waiting~ Zella Pov ~I went back to my desk.Not immediately. I stood in the hallway for approximately forty-five seconds, letting my breathing return to something resembling normal, letting my body stop doing the things it had been doing, letting my mind catch up to the fact that I had just been told I belonged to someone and had found the thought entirely too appealing.Then I straightened my dress. Checked my reflection in the glass of a dark window. Looked vaguely professional. Opened the office door and walked back in like I'd been checking emails instead of having my entire internal structure reorganized by a man who hadn't even needed to touch me to do it.Sienna was waiting with the file still under her arm, her expression perfectly neutral, the specific professionalism of someone who had worked in this environment long enough to hear nothing and see nothing and certainly not notice that my blouse was half-buttoned or that I was moving like someone who had just be

Chapter 40

Chapter 40: The Dress~Zella Pov ~I opened the bag inside the flat.Tissue paper first, layers of it, expensive and careful, the kind of wrapping that cost money. Beneath it, the dress.Pink. Not quite pink, somewhere between pink and blue, that specific luxury colour that didn't have a proper name, just existed as an aesthetic choice. It was small. Short. The kind of dress that looked like nothing on a hanger and everything on a body. I pulled it out and held it up to the light coming through the window.It was screaming expensive.Beside it, a shoe box. Heels. Delicate, strappy, the kind of thing you wore when you wanted someone to notice your legs. A bag, small and structured, in the same impossible pink-blue. And jewellery, a thin gold bracelet, earrings that caught the light like water.Everything coordinated. Everything chosen with the specific precision of someone who understood aesthetics.This was Callum saying *I want you to be beautiful tonight*. This was Callum saying *I

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