جميع فصول : الفصل -الفصل 186

The moment the car door shut, the fake smile I wore at that goddamn charity dinner melted off like wax. My jaw clenched. I sighed, the night’s weight pressing down on me.I didn’t bother acknowledging my driver. He knew better than to speak when I was like this.I exhaled sharply and rolled my neck. The suit jacket was the first thing to go, then the cufflinks—ripped off and tossed beside me. Yanked my collar open just to breathe. The air felt thick—or maybe it was just me, choking on memories.Allison.God, her name still felt like a bruise on my chest.Told myself the damn event would distract me. But it never works. Not with her.I leaned back and closed my eyes. How did I get here? From hating her with every fibre in my body… to falling so deep I couldn’t see my way out?She used to sneak out of her ex-husband’s mansion—my brother’s house. She’d arrive in designer clothes and leave wearing my scent. Every visit started with a plan—some draft to catch Dontrell, some excuse to meet—

"What are you doing here?" Clayton's voice cut through the silence. He stepped inside, his figure shadowing the doorway. "Why couldn't you stay in the living room downstairs, or at least stay in the fucking room? Why come here?"I didn’t flinch. I’d heard that bark before. Clayton Blade had always been a man of biting words. I stood there, tears wet on my face, paper clenched in my hand.I ignored his harsh words and the sting and asked, my voice trembling, "Did you mean this?" I held out the paper. "Did you mean everything you wrote here?”His jaw clenched, a muscle working beneath the skin. For a moment, I thought he might ignore me, walk away, or tell me I was being foolish. But instead, he scoffed and muttered, "You shouldn't be here.”That was all. He didn’t give me an answer. Just that damn, dismissive line—like none of it mattered. He wasn’t even looking at the paper. He wasn’t looking at me. He was looking somewhere past me, somewhere I couldn’t follow.I couldn’t stand there

I watched Clayton from across the rooftop garden as the breeze rustled the edges of his open shirt. The golden sunset flared behind him, but he didn’t look up. His gaze hovered on his phone, thumb paused over the screen, like whatever he was reading had pulled him somewhere far from me.“Again?” I asked, pitching my voice to be loud enough.He looked up slowly, locking eyes with me. That same determined gaze he wore when things got hard. When his emotions ran too deep to show.“Yes,” he said, voice low, firm. “I have to do it.”I crossed the space between us, barefoot, heart steady. “But you know you don’t owe him anything.”Clayton’s lips curved, soft and sad. “He’s my brother.”My heart ached for the way he said it. Not because it was a lie, but because it was true.Five years since the trial, since the feds shattered Dontrell’s empire. Clayton hadn’t run from the damage—he stood in it. Quietly, fiercely, with no cameras watching.He bought back every property the feds didn’t bury.