جميع فصول : الفصل -الفصل 20

The silence on the line stretched.I pressed the phone harder against my ear, pulse jumping in my throat.“Damien?”Another beat of quiet. Then his voice again, low and steady, like he was standing right behind me.“Are you alone?”I glanced toward the hallway. My mother’s door was still closed. No sound from inside.“Yes.”“Marcus left?”“How do you… ” I stopped myself. Of course he knew. Damien always seemed to know things he shouldn’t. “He left.”“Good.”That single word landed heavier than it should have. I slid down the wall until I was sitting on the floor again, knees pulled up, the wrinkled dress pooling around me.“Why are you calling?” I asked.“Because I needed to hear your voice.”The honesty in it threw me. No sarcasm. No cold distance. Just that quiet, controlled tone that somehow felt more dangerous than if he’d been shouting.I swallowed. “You shouldn’t have called.”“Probably not.”“Then why did you?”A soft exhale came through the speaker. I could picture him somewhe

The door closed behind him and the silence that followed was worse than any argument.I sat on the edge of the couch for a long time, staring at the place where he had been. The cushion still held the faint shape of him. The air still smelled like his skin and whatever expensive thing he wore that made my pulse trip over itself.My thighs still burned where his hands had been.I pressed the heels of my palms into my eyes until I saw stars. It didn’t help. Every time I blinked I saw the way he had looked at me when he said you have me now, whether you want me or not. Like it was already decided. Like my opinion was a soft, irrelevant thing he could afford to ignore.I stood up too fast. The room tilted. I walked to the bathroom on unsteady legs, locked the door, and turned the shower on as hot as it would go.Steam filled the small space. I stripped out of the ruined dress and stepped under the spray, letting the water hit my face hard enough to hurt. I wanted it to wash everything awa

My mother was on the bathroom floor. For a moment my mind simply refused to understand what it was seeing. She lay crumpled on her side between the toilet and the bathtub, one arm bent awkwardly beneath her. A thin trail of blood ran from her temple down to the tile, bright and shocking against the pale linoleum. The edge of the porcelain basin still held a small smear where her head must have struck it on the way down.“Mom.”The word came out broken.I dropped to my knees so hard the pain shot up through my bones. My hands shook as I turned her carefully onto her back. Her skin was cold. Her lips had taken on a grayish color that made my stomach turn over.“Mom. Please. Wake up.”Nothing.I pressed two fingers to the side of her neck, searching frantically for a pulse. It was there; thin, too fast, but present. I leaned down until my cheek hovered over her mouth and felt the faint, uneven warmth of her breath.She was alive. But she wasn’t waking up.I scrambled for my phone, nea

The black card sat on the new table like it was waiting for me to make a decision.I had been staring at it for so long that the early morning light had shifted across the floor. The apartment felt foreign now. Cleaner. Heavier. Every new piece of furniture was a quiet reminder that Damien had walked through my life and rearranged it without asking. The note still lay beside the card, his handwriting sharp and final.For whatever she needs.—DI picked up my phone.My thumb hovered over his number. I didn’t even know when I had saved it. Maybe I hadn’t. Maybe it had simply appeared, the same way everything else about him seemed to appear.I called.It rang.Once.Twice.Five times.Then voicemail.I hung up and called again.Same thing.The third time I let it ring all the way through, listening to the impersonal beep with my heart climbing into my throat. I didn’t leave a message. I couldn’t trust my voice.I called a fourth time.Nothing.The silence on the other end felt deliberat

The Voss Tower looked like it had been built to remind people they were small.Glass and steel stretched so high it seemed to cut the sky open. The entrance alone was bigger than the entire floor of my old office. Polished black stone. Brass fixtures that caught the morning light. A revolving door that moved soundlessly, swallowing people in expensive coats and spit them out into a lobby that smelled like money and cold air.I stood on the sidewalk with my team, one hand tight around the strap of my bag, and felt my stomach turn over for the third time that morning.Jess let out a low whistle beside me. “Okay. What the actual fuck.”I glanced at her. Jess Torres had been the only person on the team who made the old office bearable; loud, shameless, and permanently amused by everything. She was already grinning like we had just walked into a movie set instead of a corporate transfer.“You didn’t say it was this extra,” she said, nudging me with her elbow. “I thought ‘main building’ me