All Chapters of The Billionaire’s Twins Asked Santa for Me : Chapter 1 - Chapter 6

He stared at my boot like it was a personal insult.For three full seconds, neither of us moved. The wind screamed behind me, driving snow into the entryway, and I could feel my body shaking so hard my teeth were clicking together in a rhythm I couldn't control. His jaw tightened. Something shifted behind his eyes, not warmth, not concern, but calculation. The math of liability.He stepped back.I pushed through the gap before he could change his mind. The door swung shut and the silence hit almost as hard as the heat. My legs buckled. I caught myself on the wall, fingers so numb I couldn't feel the surface, and stood there dripping onto what was probably a ten-thousand-dollar rug."You have tonight." His voice hadn't changed. Same flat tone. Same clipped delivery, like every word cost him money and he resented the expense. "Guest wing is down the hall, last door on the left. You stay there. You don't wander. You don't touch anything."I looked up at him, still shaking, water running

Day three, and Dominic Ashford ran his household like a man who believed that if he controlled every variable, nothing could hurt him again.Breakfast at seven thirty. Lunch at noon. Dinner at six. No noise after eight PM. No visitors in his study, ever. The rules weren't posted anywhere, but they didn't need to be. They lived in the air, in the way Mrs. Flores moved through the kitchen on a timer, in the way Luca lowered his voice when his father entered a room.I watched them at breakfast from my designated seat at the far end of the table (close enough to eat, far enough to be invisible, which I was fairly sure was the point). Dominic sat at the head with a tablet propped against the salt shaker, scanning something that made his jaw tight. Luca talked around a mouthful of eggs about a dream he'd had involving a talking penguin. Lily ate in silence, her eyes on her plate."Elbows off the table, Luca."Luca dropped his elbows. Keep talking. The penguin had apparently driven a submari

{Next Day}"I said no, Mother. That's final."I froze in the hallway with my coffee halfway to my mouth. Dominic's study door was cracked open, just an inch, and his voice carried through the gap like a blade."I don't care what she told you. I don't care what her lawyers are saying." A pause. His tone dropped, quieter but harder. "Being reasonable is what got me into this. I was reasonable when she said she needed space. I was reasonable when she missed their birthday. I am done being reasonable."Silence. Then: "If you call me about this again, I will stop answering."The phone hit the desk. I backed away before the door could open, my heart thudding for reasons I couldn't justify. This was the fifth day of being snowed in. The roads were still buried. The travel ban held. And whatever Dominic Ashford was fighting on the other side of that door, it was getting worse.I needed something to do before I lost my mind.The twins' playroom was the obvious answer. It sat at the end of the