<b>Chapter 88 </b>


    -HUNTER-


    The mansion felt different when I walked through the front doors. Colder somehow, despite the warm


    afternoon sun streaming through the windows.


    The staff moved around me like ghosts, their eyes sliding away whenever I tried to make contact.


    Something was wrong.


    “Wee home, Mr. Hunter,” Sally said, but her usual stern confidence was reced by something that looked almost like guilt.


    “Thank you.” I set down my briefcase, studying her face. “Where’s Celine?”


    Sally’s hands twisted in her apron. “Theundry room, sir. She’s been… keeping busy.”


    The way she said it made my chest tighten. I headed toward the back of the house, passing staff members


    who suddenly found urgent tasks that required their immediate attention elsewhere.


    Theundry room was filled with the sound of running water and the mechanical hum of washing


    machines.


    721


    Celine stood with her back to me, folding sheets with sharp, angry movements. Her shoulders were stiff, her


    chestnut hair escaping from its usual neat bun.


    She knew I was there. I could tell by the way her movements became even more precise and more


    controlled.


    “Celine.”


    She didn’t turn around. Just kept folding the same sheet over and over, her knuckles white where she gripped the fabric. <fn6f65> The source of th?s content is Find?Novel</fn6f65>


    “How was your trip?” Her voice was t, empty of the warmth I had grown used to.


    “Fine.” I stepped closer, close enough to smell her soap and something else….the salt of dried tears.


    “Where’s Caesar?”


    “Your mother took him for a drive.” She finally turned, and the sight of her hit me like a physical blow. Her eyes were swollen and red–rimmed, her face pale except for the dark circles under her eyes.


    “ording to her, anyway.”


    The bitterness in her voice made my stomach clench. Mother had done more than just take Caesar for a day. She had done something to break the spirit I had fallen in love with.


    “She likes children,” 1 said, hating how weak the excuse sounded even to my ears.


    Celine’sugh was sharp and bitter. “Does she?”


    The question hung between us, loaded with everything we weren’t saying


    I wanted to tell her the truth….that I knew Caesar was mine, that Mother knew too, that I had spent the entire flight home trying to figure out how to protect them both.


    But the words stuck in my throat. Because telling her the truth meant admitting I had known and done nothing. It meant facing the usation I saw lurking in her eyes.


    “Celine….”


    “Don’t.” She turned back to theundry, her voice breaking. “Just don’t.”


    But I could see her shoulders shaking, could hear the quiet sobs she was trying to hide. Before I could think, before I could stop myself, I crossed the space between us and pulled her into my arms.


    She fought me immediately, her small fists pounding against my chest. “Let me go! You don’t get to…not after….”


    “I’m not letting go,” I said against her hair, holding her tighter as she struggled. “I am never letting go.”


    “You already did!” The words tore out of her like they had been ripped from somewhere deep inside. “You left me here alone with her, and she…” Her voice brokepletely.


    “What did she do?” The question came out harsh, and violent. “Tell me what she did.”


    But instead of answering, she looked up at me with those devastated eyes, and something snapped inside me. All the restraint I had been holding onto for weeks, all the careful distance I had tried to maintain….it crumbled.


    I kissed her.


    She made a sound of protest against my mouth, her hands pushing at my shoulders even as her lips parted under mine.


    I could taste salt….her tears, mine, I didn’t know…but I couldn’t stop. Wouldn’t stop.-


    “No,” she whispered against my lips, but her arms were winding around my neck, pulling me closer. “We can’t…I can’t…”


    “Don’t think,” I breathed, backing her against the wall. “Don’t think about anything but this.”


    Her response was desperate, hungry, like she had been starving and I was her first meal in days. She kissed me like she was drowning and I was air, like she was falling and I was the only thing that could catch her.


    14:58 Sun, 8 Aug


    * 42%


    I pressed her harder against the wall, my hands tangling in her hair, finally letting it fall free around her


    shoulders.


    She was so small against me, so fragile, but the way she kissed me back was fierce…all teeth and tongue and barely contained need.


    “I missed you,” she gasped against my mouth, the words torn from her like a confession. “God help me, I missed you so much.”


    “I know,” I whispered, trailing kisses down her throat, tasting the salt of her tears on her skin. “I know, baby.


    I’m here now.”


    Her hands fisted in my shirt, pulling me closer, and I could feel her heartbeat hammering against my chest.


    She tilted her head back, giving me better ess to the sensitive spot where her neck met her shoulder, and the soft sound she made when I kissed her there nearly brought me to my knees.


    “We shouldn’t,” she whispered, but her body was saying somethingpletely different, arching into me like she couldn’t get close enough.


    “Tell me to stop.” I caught her bottom lip between my teeth, gentle but insistent. “Tell me to walk away and I


    will.”


    She stared at me for a long moment, her chest rising and falling rapidly, her lips swollen from my kisses.


    Then she pulled my head down to hers and kissed me with a desperation that matched my own.


    This time when I kissed her back, it was with everything I had…all the longing I had been hiding, all the love


    I had been too afraid to name, all the promises I couldn’t make but wanted to.


    I kissed her like I could keep her safe through sheer force of will like I could build a wall around us that


    nothing could prate.


    She responded with equal intensity, her small hands clutching at me like I might disappear if she let go. When we finally broke apart, both of us breathing hard, she pressed her forehead against mine.


    “She’s different with him,” she whispered against my chest. “Your mother. She looks at Caesar like… like she’s nning something.”


    I stiffened but kept my voice carefully neutral. “What do you mean?”


    “I don’t know. But the way she watches him, the things she says…” Her voice trailed off, and I could feel her pulling back, remembering where we were, what we were doing.


    “Celine…”


    “This can’t happen again.” She pushed against my chest, but gently this time, like she didn’t really want me


    14:59 Sun, 9 <b>Aug </b>V


    Chapter SS


    to let go. “I can’t… I have to protect Caesar. He’s all I have.”


    442%量


    The pain in her voice nearly broke me. She thought she was alone in this, though she had to face my


    mother’s maniptions by herself.


    “You’re not alone,” I said quietly.


    She looked up at me with those wounded eyes, and I could see she wanted to believe me. But trust was a


    luxury she couldn’t afford anymore.


    “I have to get back to work,” she whispered. “Your mother will be back with Caesar soon, and if she finds us


    like this…”


    She didn’t finish the sentence, but we both knew what she meant. Mother would use it as another weapon,


    another way to prove Celine was unfit.


    I stepped back reluctantly, watching as she smoothed her hair and tried topose herself. But her hands were still shaking, and there were tears she couldn’t quite hide.


    “This isn’t over,” I said.


    She met my eyes for just a moment, and I saw everything she couldn’t say, the love, the fear, the desperate hope she was trying to kill before it killed her.


    “It has to be,” she whispered. “For Caesar’s sake, it has to be.”