Married To The Wrong Twin のすべてのチャプター: チャプター 31 - チャプター 40

Neither of us said much on the drive home, comfortable enough silence, radio low, his hand resting on the gearshift close enough to mine that I kept noticing it without either of us doing anything about the noticing."Your parents like you," I said eventually, mostly just to say something."They tolerate me. There's a difference.""Your mother hugged you twice tonight.""She hugs everyone twice. It's not a reliable metric." He glanced over, something almost amused in it. "You survived the interrogation, for what it's worth. I wasn't entirely certain you would.""I had a good coach.""I did very little coaching. You handled my father better than most people twice your age manage to.""He's easy to talk to.""He's easy to talk to when he's decided he likes you. I've watched him make grown men in board meetings visibly regret every decision that led them into a room with him. You got the version most people never see.""I'll consider myself flattered.""You should. I don't say it lightly

The boardroom felt smaller than I remembered it, though I suspected that had less to do with the room and more to do with everyone currently occupying it.Ivy was already seated when we walked in, composed, put together, a lawyer on either side of her like a matched set of bookends, and she didn't look at either of us as we took our seats across the table, which somehow felt worse than if she had. Julian was there too, further down the table, unusually quiet, a legal pad in front of him he hadn't written a single word on since we'd entered."Mrs. Ashford," Warrick said, before the session had even formally opened, testing the title like he enjoyed the taste of it. "Or should I still be asking whether that title's currently accurate.""Warrick." Callum's voice stayed flat, controlled, though I felt him go rigid beside me. "We haven't started yet.""I'm simply reading the room. It's my understanding this board is being asked to extend a thirty-day clause based on a good-faith attempt at

The Monday after the board meeting, Callum left before I was even fully awake, and I found the note on the counter before I'd finished my first cup of coffee. Ivy reinstatement logistics all week. Home late most nights. Don't wait on dinner.I read it twice, the way I'd started reading most of his notes lately, looking for something underneath the words that I suspected, even as I looked, probably wasn't actually there to find.The week went the way the note promised. He was gone before I woke most mornings, and by the time he got home the kitchen light was usually the only sign he'd made it back at all before disappearing into the study.Tuesday I waited up until midnight, some ridiculous, stubborn part of me convinced that if I just stayed downstairs long enough, whatever version of him came through the door would be the one from before the board meeting rather than whoever this new, distracted one turned out to be. He finally came in a little past eleven, keys dropped on the counte

Simone picked the coffee shop, which should have warned me she'd also pick the entire conversation before I'd even sat down. It was a small, crowded place a few blocks from the studio, mismatched chairs, a chalkboard menu half rubbed out from use, exactly the kind of place I suspected she'd chosen specifically because it left no room for either of us to perform anything. Someone a few tables over was wearing a perfume so strong it reached me before I'd even sat down, sweet and cloying in a way that made my eyes water slightly, and I found myself angling my chair a few unsubtle degrees away from it before I'd consciously decided to, chalking it up to the place being too crowded for its own ventilation."You're doing the thing," she said, before I'd gotten my coat off."What thing.""The thing where you smile with your mouth but your shoulders stay up around your ears the whole time. I noticed it Monday too. I just didn't have coffee yet to properly diagnose it.""I don't have a diagnos

Callum's POVI'd meant to say something to Odessa that morning. I'd stood in the kitchen with the sentence half formed, something about the distance, something about how tired I was of both of us pretending we didn't notice it, and she'd left for the studio before I found the nerve to finish it. I told myself I'd try again that evening. I didn't yet know how badly the evening was going to get away from me.Ivy came by around six, ostensibly for the last of the transition paperwork, though we'd finished that inside twenty minutes and she'd made no move to leave."Can I ask you something. Off the record.""That depends entirely on the question.""Are you two still doing the clinical rounds. The appointments, the scheduling, all of it." She said it lightly, turning her cup a slow circle on the desk without drinking from it."That's not a conversation I'm having with you.""I'll take that as a no, then." She studied me a moment, something almost sympathetic in it, which somehow made what