Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 31 - Chapitre 40

Rica finished the last of the eggs in silence. The plate was clean. The coffee had gone lukewarm. Derrick remained on the opposite side of the island, still bare-chested, still watching her with that same quiet intensity that made the air feel thinner than it should have been at this hour.He didn’t speak again. He simply collected both plates, rinsed them with the same precise economy he applied to everything else, and left them in the sink. Then he rounded the island one final time, stopped behind her stool, and rested both hands on the edge of the marble on either side of her body. Not touching. Not quite.“Upstairs,” he said, voice low. “Change. Something that covers the marks. Hartley will be watching every camera the second we step into the building.”Rica rose. The movement pulled at the residual tenderness between her thighs, a dull, intimate reminder she refused to show on her face. She turned to face him. The morning light caught the faint red lines her nails had left across

“No,” she agreed quietly. “You’re worse. Because you’re honest. Because you told me exactly what this is and I still..” She cut herself off before the dangerous word could escape. “I still let myself feel things I cannot afford. So I cried. And then I stopped. And now I am sitting in this chair beside you ready to dismantle whatever Hartley thinks he can still take. That is all you need to know.”Something raw moved through his eyes. For a moment the winter calm cracked. He leaned closer, close enough that she could smell the cedar and the faint residual heat of his skin, close enough that anyone watching would know this was not a professional conversation.“You still haven’t answered the real question,” he murmured. “Did you cry because you hate what we are… or because you want more than the contract allows?”Rica’s pulse hammered against the high collar of her blouse. The trut

The elevator that carried them upward was crowded with executives and assistants. Rica stood close enough to Derrick that their shoulders brushed with every slight movement of the car. She felt the heat of him through the silk of her blouse. She felt the weight of the diamond on her finger. She felt the vow she had made in the shower cracking under the pressure of everything he had just said.I love him.I will not let him know how much.When the six months endThe doors opened onto the forty-second floor before she could finish the thought.Hartley’s people were already waiting in the reception area. Three of them. All men. All smiling the careful, predatory smiles of people who had been sent to test the edges of a new alliance. The tallest one Marcus Hale’s former second, a man named Keller let his gaze travel over Rica with open appreciation before it settled on the diamond.“Mrs. Voss,” he said, the title deliberate

The next hour was spent in complete silence.Rica stayed longer than necessary in the walk-in closet where her hands brushed through silk and cashmere fabrics which she could barely see. Everything she did brought out the sparkle in the diamond in her finger, which constantly reminded her of the only language she had accepted to speak. Rica grabbed a chic dress made of black charcoal fabric which hugged her just right and had a high neck to cover the bruises but low enough to let the breeze caress her skin. She carried no weapons tonight. Only her weakness in admitting that the walls she built for herself had broken down.As she descended from upstairs, the dinner table was set. Two seats. Dim lighting. A bottle of red wine resting between them. Derrick was standing at the floor-length windows with his whiskey-filled glass, in the same white shirt that he wore before, but rolled up to his elbows, where she could see the scars from before. He turned around as soon as her feet landed on

Rica blocked the number. Then she rose, walked into the bathroom, and splashed cold water on her face until the flush left her cheeks. When she looked in the mirror the woman staring back still carried every mark Derrick had left. She also looked like someone already halfway out the door. Her reflection’s eyes were too bright.Dinner was set for seven.She went downstairs five minutes late on purpose, heart hammering against her ribs.Derrick was already seated, a glass of whiskey untouched beside his plate. He looked up the moment she appeared, gaze moving over the high neck of her cashmere, the careful distance she kept as she took the chair opposite him. Something in his expression made her want to run.“You’re late.”“I was finishing the Chen annotations.” Her voice came out thinner than she wanted.“You’re still avoiding me.”“I’m protecting myself.” Rica unfolded her napk