CH.103

"Karl!" Talia's usually warm voice was now cold as ice. "What are you doing here?"

Lavinia felt her heart stutter at the sound of her husband's name.

She moved forward slowly, as if in a trance until she could see past Talia's rigid form to the man standing on their doorstep.

His sudden and unexpected presence invoked a storm of emotions within her – fear, anger, sadness, and despite everything, an underlying lingering sense of longing that she could never quite extinguish all swirled together sickeningly.

"K...Karl!" she uttered.

Karl's intense gaze was transfixed solely on Lavinia, drinking in her delicate beauty which seemed to intensify the longing that burned within him.

He yearned to cross the space between them and take her into his arms, to pour out the torrent of emotions he had been harboring for so long – his regret, his sorrow, his enduring love for her that had never wavered despite his greatest failing.

The complicated relationships between Lavinia an