جميع فصول : الفصل -الفصل 44

Bianca wasn't able to sleep properly, she lay in the dark of her room in the Anderson mansion, staring at the ceiling, turning the sentence over in her mind like something she could hold up to the light and examine. “I don't like watching him look at you like that." She spent weeks teaching herself to read Ethan Anderson. The careful half-smiles, the deliberate pauses. The silences that carried more than words ever did. She knew what he sounded like when he was performing, when he was deflecting, when he was giving someone the answer they expected so he could move on to the next thing. She'd learned the rhythm of it, the way he kept himself tucked behind walls he'd spent years building. That sentence hadn't come from behind a wall. It had come out before he'd decided to say it. She'd heard the slip in his voice, seen the way he'd looked away immediately after, as if the words had escaped and he was already trying to chase them back. And then, when she'd asked him what he m

Daniel started with the money. He didn’t bring it up directly, of course, because that would have been too obvious. Instead, he let it sit in the space between them, mentioned casually over the first drink as though it had just occurred to him. “You know, when I covered that cheque, I never expected anything back. I want you to know that. I did it because you needed help, and that was enough for me.”Adam nodded slowly, eyes on the table. “I know.”Daniel watched him for a moment, then leaned back and tried a different angle. “I thought we were friends, Adam. I really did. I still do.”“We are friends,” Adam said quietly.“Then help me understand what’s changed.” Daniel’s voice was soft, almost wounded. “A few weeks ago, you would have trusted me with anything. Now you won’t even look at me.”Adam did look at him then, and something in his expression was steadier than Daniel had seen before. “A few weeks ago, you asked for a scheduling report. Now you’re asking for access credentials