CELESTE I walked through the front door and the smell hit me before anything else. Sex. Sweat. The kind of thick, used air that comes from bodies that have been tangled together. I knew that smell. I had come home to it many times before, back when I was still stupid enough to trust Julian. I looked at Seraphine sitting on my sofa, and I looked at Julian standing near the kitchen doorway with that fake concern on his face, and I knew exactly what they had been doing while I was gone. The thought should have burned. It didn't. It just sat there in my chest, cold and still, like a stone I had swallowed a long time ago and finally stopped choking on. Hearing Julian talk about fidelity, I resisted the urge to slap him. Just entering the house, taking one look at Sera with her smeared lipstick and the smell of sex all over this room, I knew they had just finished. Probably right on my couch. Maybe against the wall. Maybe in my bed. It didn't matter anymore. Nothing they did could
Last Updated : 2026-06-13 Read more