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21. The decision

Auteur: Meminger
last update Dernière mise à jour: 2025-02-15 22:21:38

Three Years later

Elliot POV

It was morning, and I was heading to Sammy's room to wake him up for school. The boy had been getting increasingly sad lately, and the fact that we had moved to Chicago seemed not to have helped.

I approached his bed with a sigh, crouching down and pulling back his blanket. "Come on, Sammy. Time to wake up," I said, running my hand over his head.

But the boy recoiled, grumbling. "No, please..."

"But you have to go to school," I said.

"No, school is boring," he grumbled.

I sighed again. Sammy and I were trying to build a new life away from all the noise of London, although living our hearts' truth didn't mean it was easy. "Come on, buddy. You promised me you'd try to make it work."

The almost eight-year-old boy sat up in bed, looking at me with a still sleepy expression. "Dad, do you think she misses us?" the boy asked with sorrow.

He didn't need to say the name for me to know who he was talking about. It was obvious he was talking about Reese. After our d
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  • Traded For His First Love    22. Venus

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  • Traded For His First Love    23. The inevitable meeting

    Reese POVThere, seated at the piano at the engagement party of young entrepreneur Josh Carter and his fiancée Bethany Skyland, immersed in a performance that had become my escape and my expression, my soul vibrated with each note. But when my eyes, almost by chance, found Elliot in the midst of the room, the world seemed to stop.It had been so long since I had last seen him that, for a moment, I thought my eyes were deceiving me. But there he was, at that engagement party, as real as the keys beneath my fingers.On the outside, I maintained the serenity that characterized me now, but inside, a whirlwind of emotions and past traumas stirred. A thousand thoughts collided in my mind: "Should I get up and run? Ignore him? Pretend I don't know him? Keep him away?" But then, I remembered that time had passed, and I was no longer that vulnerable woman. Now, I was Venus, a new version of myself, strong and independent.I kept my fingers on the piano, continuing to play, but my mind wandered

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  • Traded For His First Love    24. Like a phoenix

    Elliot POVWhen I saw Reese at that engagement party of the young entrepreneur Josh Carter, her there playing the piano, her fingers delicately playing a melody so well-known to both of us, the sensation I felt was as if my heart wanted to leap out of my mouth. I really didn't expect to see her in that place, after all the places I had searched for her over all this time, to find her so randomly when I least expected it truly caught me by surprise.And Reese was such a different woman that I almost didn't recognize her. Her hair, her makeup, her clothes, they made her look like another woman I didn't know, but her mannerisms were still there, her voice and her gaze too, especially when her beautiful hazel eyes locked onto me.I saw a slight agitation form in her look when she recognized me, proving to me that she was as surprised as I was. "So this is where you've been hiding, my love?" My eyes asked this, conveying the tenderness I was feeling inside.Reese returned to playing her pi

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  • Traded For His First Love    26. How many lies will this man tell more?

    Reese POVI stood there, frozen, not knowing what to say, staring at him as if he were a hallucination in the middle of a desert. His words echoed in my mind, but I simply couldn’t believe what I was hearing. He was sorry? He wanted me back? After everything?I had never allowed myself to forget my son. Never. Every day since he was torn from me, I remembered him. Every victory of mine, every step I took, it was all so that one day I could pull him from Elliot Goodwin’s grasp. I hated that man with every fiber of my being. He destroyed me, discarded me as if I were nothing. And now he was here, begging me to come back to him. As if it were that simple."Reese..." His voice was hoarse, thick with emotion. But I didn’t trust it. Not anymore. "I separated from Jennifer. She never meant anything. I don’t know how I listened to my mother and her. I was blind, I made mistakes, but I never stopped loving you. I moved to Chicago with Sammy. He misses you. He wants you there."I felt a pang in

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  • Traded For His First Love    27. Shaken

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  • Traded For His First Love    28. How I hate him!

    Reese POVThe car glided through the dark streets of Chicago, the soft hum of the engine the only sound filling the silence I so desperately needed. Mr. Brown, my private driver, steered with his usual calm, his eyes fixed on the road while I lost myself in thoughts in the back seat. He didn’t say anything beyond his initial greeting, respecting the heaviness that seemed to radiate from me, as if he could sense I needed that space to breathe, to think.I couldn’t get Elliot’s words out of my head. They echoed like a relentless drum, each syllable laden with a meaning I didn’t want to confront. He said he was sorry, that he had divorced Jennifer, that he wanted me back. Good Lord, what was I supposed to do with that? My mind spun in circles, trying to find sense where there might be none. Part of me screamed not to trust him again, to remember every betrayal, every blow he had dealt me.But another part, small, fragile, and full of hope, whispered: what if it’s true?I wanted to bel

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  • Traded For His First Love    29. Resilience

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