Noémie couldn’t quite believe what she had agreed to until she woke up to find herself in Ajax’s arms.It should have been a nightmare at its best.The terrible memories should have come back to her.It should have made every inch of her skin prickle with unease.It should have been embarrassing to know she had caved in to the desire of a man she swore to hate.To her dismay—or maybe not so—the moment she opened her eyes, only the feeling of safety and comfort warmed its way into and around her heart.She couldn’t help it.The way giddiness danced in her stomach, the way butterflies fluttered their wings against her ribs.She felt tickled and ticklish everywhere.Pulling her lower lip between her teeth, when Noémie turned herself just enough to glance over her shoulder, something inside her literally melted at the sight of a sleeping Ajax.There was no other way to explain it. Her cheeks felt warm all over again and her back—which was pressed against his chest—broke into sweats.Not b
Drawing his nose across the length of her shoulder, he planted a long kiss at the curve, and before she could pose a protest—or even think of one— he turned her around to face the ceiling and straddled her thighs.A look of pure bliss gleamed in his dark eyes that somehow led a strange glow to her own chest.“I did…” she answered, feeling those butterflies ready to flutter their wings. “…I think.”“You think?” Tipping his head to a small angle, he asked. “Why not sure?”“I mean….it feels like I slept enough. But if you look at the time, we barely slept for like…four hours tops.”“Point!” he agreed, and Noémie saw when a look of regret passed over his face and he dropped back on his side, facing her. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t help myself.” He sounded genuinely apologetic.Noémie turned on her side to face him, her fingers reaching up to flick some hair out of his forehead. “Neither could I. Because I know you would have stopped if I had told you to.”She knew it was the truth. Maybe she w
For the millionth time since Ajax had set foot in the old Halest Villa, he looked at the time and sighed worriedly in his chest.Vincent should have reached home by now.He hadn’t.Not only that. Even his number had been unreachable for a reason he could not figure out.Ajax only hoped for him to be alright.There was already a tornado knocking at the doors. There was really no need for any more bad news in their lives.At least not for a while. Who knew how long it would take to get over this one? The betrayal, that is.It went without saying how much his father’s betrayal disturbed him to the bones.He was disgusted by him.The man he had known all his life—the so-called father figure—could do something so horrendous, could nurse such a sick mentality, nauseated him to his very gut.The truth was that if it weren’t for Noémie by his side, and his determination to not lose control, he would have exploded like every nerve ending in his body was pushing him to.If it weren’t for Noémie
Sonia Halest breathed in a deep breath, trying to get a hold of all the crying and all that impending hurt she had locked in for so long.“That was the reason I wanted you to marry Noémie. I know it was wrong to ask of such a thing after everything that girl had been through. All that hurt and trauma. We can’t even imagine. But I knew in my heart that you would have loved her. I would have loved her. More than anyone ever could. More than you and Vince, maybe. Like my own daughter. I wanted to give that girl my everything. I wanted her to have all the happiness in the universe. All of it.”Ajax leaned forward to wipe the tears off her face. He cupped her jaw and made her look at him.“Mom, it’s not your fault.”“It is. Isn’t it? If only I would have…”“Mom, if you had known what he had been up to, what kind of monster he had been keeping from us, you wouldn’t have to think twice before doing what was right. I know that. I know you. You just didn’t know.”“But why do I feel responsible
“So, what did you want to talk about?” Ajax asked calmly, as he motioned Claudia to take a seat across the long office desk.After the cops arrived with the arrest warrant and surrounded the entire estate in case his father returned, Ajax led Noémie’s sister up the stairs to the study room.It was the only place he could think of for a private conversation.With Sonia Halest on edge and Hannah being weird, the last thing he wanted was to give them something more to fret about.Whatever Claudia was there for, he would have to deal with it on his own.Although deep down, he couldn’t shake off this feeling of dread inside him. As if whatever was about to come out of her mouth would hurt him, more than he was in the right mind to bear.Claudia sank into the cushioned chair, pulled it closer to the desk, and propped her hands on the table.“First of all, fuck you.” Claudia hissed through her teeth, fixing him with a heated gaze she thought he would understand all too well.The weird part w
Claudia felt so torn at the moment.She wanted to answer all the questions thrown her way—the woman looked frightened out of her mind—but she also couldn’t sight of Ajax.For some reason, she felt utterly uncomfortable after seeing his reaction upstairs. The way he almost broke that door…“We don’t have time for this…” she said to the woman hurriedly. “I need to follow him.”And then she pulled her arm from Sonia’s grasp and took off after the male who had just reached the main doors.But just when Claudia turned her focus back on Ajax and rushed behind him, someone crashed into her.Something fell.Someone grunted.“What the—” she heard someone yell. A woman, most probably. And not just any woman. The one who seemed to hold some sort of grudge against her. Who the fuck knew what her problem was?“Are you fucking blind?” Hannah groaned with a frown, rubbing her upper arm before trying to push herself off the floor.“Hannah…” Sonia Halest helped her get back on her feet. “Are you alrig
[PAST]“You can’t be serious about this!” In his drunken haze, Ajax heard his father growl. But because he was too far gone to give a damn, he merely rolled his eyes and made himself another drink.Ajax was on his fifth shot when Michael Halest rained inside the study room, loud and red with mad anger.“I’m talking to you, Ajax!” the old man roared. “What the fuck are you doing with your life?”“I’m fucking grieving!” Ajax snarled, clutching the tumbler tightly in his grasp. “Can’t a man even grieve in solace? What the fuck is your problem?”Michael Halest bristled at the tone of his older son. He couldn’t stand it. So, instead of leaving his son alone—like he had literally begged him to a few minutes ago—the man grabbed him by the collar of his shirt, yanked him off the chair, and scowled. “Excuses!” the man gritted out. “Fucking all excuses!”“So what?” Ajax snapped back, upper lip curling in a snarl. “Why the fuck do you care?” he ripped the hands of his father off his shirt, stumb
[PAST....CONTINUED]In the next ten seconds, he had this woman shoved into a room and up against the wall. Her mouth in his. His hands all over her body.Veronica moaned out loud when he tugged at her nipple.“Shhhh~ not so loud, my darling,” Michael Halest hissed into her mouth. “Ajax is still in the next room. We don’t want him to hear whatever is going on here now, do we?”Veronica shook her head, immediately wrapping her legs around his waist when he picked her up and pushed her back harder against the wall. “No,” she panted. “But it’s the thrill of being caught that’s getting me hornier.”“Oh, really now?” the man chuckled, gathering her skirt up around her slim waist and drawing his thick cock out of his pants. “Maybe we can convince him to join us the next time, huh? Would you like that? Would you like being fucked with both father and son at the same time?”“Fuck yeah!” she couldn’t help but bite into his shoulder—silencing her cries of ecstasy— as he drove into her with no me
Claire hadn’t expected Vincent to prepare the contract so soon. It took her by surprise when the same delivery men appeared at her grandma’s place the next day and brought her back to the old Halest Villa.According to the giant clock hung in the drawing room, it was exactly 9 o’clock in the morning. The old Halest Villa was dreadfully quieter than the previous day. The maids and guards were the only people she noticed since the moment she walked in and took a seat on the couch, waiting for Vincent to make an appearance.Claire was nervous. Her legs were shaking with anxiousness after every passing second. The conversation she had with Marvin the previous day didn’t make her feel any better either. It made her feel even worse. She knew she shouldn’t be hiding something so important from Vincent—especi
[Nine Months Ago]A man in a white lab coat punched a six-digit code and waited calmly as the heavy metal door groaned and slowly slid open. Behind him, two tall and hefty men stood. One of them carried an unconscious woman in his arms.The door revealed a restless lab, with men in similar lab coats bustling here and there. The pungent scent of chemicals and something acidic hung heavy in the air.As the three men entered the lab, the man in the lab coat paused and lifted a hand to guide the two large men.“Take her to cube number five,” the man said, and without waiting for a response, headed in the opposite direction.The two hefty men followed the order and stationed the unconsci
Marvin pursed his lips, settling back in his seat and crossing his arms over his chest. “Fine. Let’s talk about something else, then.”Just by the shift in his tone, Claire could tell what was coming next.“Would you like to explain that video about your pregnancy?”“Not really.”“Claire!”Claire groaned and held her head in her hands. “Why do you even care?”“You’re doing that to get that Halest boy, aren’t you?”“So what?”“You need to let him go!”“I can’t. You know I…I can’t do that.” How could he even ask her such a thing?“It’s not fair to him, Claire. He doesn’t know—”“He doesn’t have to know.”“Claire!” He leaned forward, his gaze hopeful and brimmed with concern. “Don’t do this. You’re just hurting yourself. And him. It’s not fair…” He reached out and cupped the back of her hand with his. “…to you, too.”Claire yanked her hand away. “Drop the act, Marvin. We both know you don’t give a crap about me.”“I don’t know what I’ve done to make you feel like this.”“Are you serious?
The second the elevator doors of Grandma’s apartment building opened, Claire groaned at the sight of Marvin, her older brother. God, what was he doing here? she thought to herself.After the intense conversation with Vincent, the exact delivery guys dropped her back at the place they picked her up from.“What are you doing here?” she asked exasperatedly as she shuffled out of the elevator while rubbing her temple.At the sight of her, Marvin peeled his back off the wall and stood up straighter. “I’ve been out here for almost an hour,” he grumbled. “Where have you been?” Adjusting the collar of his shirt, he demanded with a deep frown.“First off, that’s not the answer to my question,” she paused in front of him to fix him with an annoyed look. “And second, why are you outside again?”In response to her question, Marvin only sighed deeply in his chest, scratching the back of his neck. “She won’t let me in,” he muttered with a shake of his head, clearly talking about Grandma. “I would h
“Not to me, but to yourself.” Stepping away, he yanked her hands away from his shirt. “You always tell yourself these sweet lies and find comfort in them, Claire. You think you’ve changed, but you’re still the same.” Turning on his heels, he ran a hand through his hair. Frustrated.“Vincent…”“This time you went too far, Claire. Too far. You dragged my family into this. I’m not sure if I can ever forgive you for misleading them with your fucked-up lies.”“Don’t say that, Vince. I did this for you. For us.”“Stop it, Claire!” He snapped, wanting nothing more than to yank his hair out. “Just stop it!”Rushing to him, she hugged him from behind. More tears flowed through her red-rimmed eyes. “I know what I did
Claire knew she had gone too far. She knew what came out of her mouth was bound to fuck everything up. Even more than her situation already was. Vince would hate her. He didn’t have to spell it out for her to know she was only worsening her impression in his eyes.What other choice did she have, though?She was running out of not only time, but also options. Patience was her least remarkable character trait, after all. And when it came to Vincent, her patience grew even thinner. So much time she had already wasted in coming to her senses that now every second she had to stay away from him felt like a stab of the knife straight to her heart.Perhaps that was the reason that when Ajax dismissed her and she was led out of the study by a maid, she wasn’t surprised—or let out even a squeak in protest—when Vincent grabbed her by the arm and dragged her into the closest empty room.
[Six Months Ago]After seeing off her husband at the airport for a two-days business trip, when a woman named Susan Green returned to her apartment, she barely kicked off her shoes and filled herself with a glass of water when a knock on the door arrived.Unsure of who it might be at the lunch hour, she opened the door only to find no one outside.Susan frowned. She was pretty sure she had heard the knock. Not once. Not twice. But thrice. Someone had knocked at the door thrice. Wondering if the kids in the building had once again picked up the bad habit of annoying the random neighbours, she closed the door and locked it.However, just when she hoped to get back to the kitchen counter and grab herself a glass of water, her gaze fell on the yellow manila envelope on the floor. It looked like someone had slipped it inside from under the door
Claire did as she was told. Quietly, she pulled the back of the chair and sat down with her fingers tightly laced with each other.For a long minute, no one said anything. The only sound in the room seemed to be the ticking of the clock. The tension in the room felt tighter and thicker than she had ever experienced. When someone did speak, it came from her left where Sonia Halest sat.“Is it true?” The older woman asked with a frown.Before Claire could clarify what the question was regarding, Vincent beat her to it.“Of course, it’s not!” He snapped, pounding a fist on the desk and glaring at Ajax. “Did you even hear a word I said? It’s all a lie. There’s nothing between us.”“Vince…” Claire tried to say when he spun his head and glared at her.
Claire sighed into her chest and felt her back slump against the door. Her heart ached to see him this mad at her. She wondered what could she possibly do to make things back to normal between them.On second thought, things had never been normal between them. Perhaps that was the reason she felt so clueless and hopeless and helpless. She did not have a single clue what could she say or do to make him love her the way he did once. Had she taken too long to come to her senses? Was it possible that he liked someone else now?Claire hated the idea of Vince being with some other woman. No. That would not do. He only belonged to her. He only loved her. Sure, he was refusing to admit that right now, but she wasn’t planning on giving up on them soon. She would make him hers, no matter what price she had to pay.With that determination in her heart, she sucked in another deep breath