glides up the main driveway toward the house. I knew it was coming. It’s why I’m standing in the bedroom window of the cottage, looking out.
Watching.
Waiting.
Yet even though I knew to expect it, the slash across my heart at the sight still steals the air from my lungs in a rush, drawing out a sob that I quickly rein back in.
He’s back.
I turn, catching sight of the wide-eyed girl. Skin that’s pale and lackluster, lips that have forgotten how to smile, eyes that are dull. Dead.
I turn away from the giant ornate mirror, its beautiful, gilded bird like a taunting reminder…
Two days.
Two whole days since I last saw Dax.
Two days of him refusing to see me while he was being held in jail.
Logan went. Jasmin went. Even Larry who brought the mirror to the cottage for me went.
The entire fucking world was allowed to visit Dax.
But not me.
I was told by multiple police officers, and by Logan and Jasmin that Dax didn’t want me to visit him. He didn’t want me to see him in there. Locked up. But as my despair grew, so did the pity in their eyes. They didn’t know what to say. How could they? By the second day, he didn’t just not want me to see him in there, he didn’t want to see me—period.
The last few years of my life has been one great big shitshow. But never for one second did I expect Dax to deliver the cherry on top of it.
I sit on the end of the bed, dropping my head into my hands. But memories of Dax making love to me here flood my brain cruelly, so I jump up and head downstairs, reaching the bottom step as there’s a knock at the door.
My heart lifts in hope, then promptly drops as I open the door.
“Oh. Hi.”
“Well, it’s better than some welcomes I get, I suppose.”
Logan walks inside, then closes the door behind himself as I wander over to the front window and gaze out. I can make out parts of the top floor of the house through the trees. Dax’s bedroom window being one part. But it’s too far to see whether he’s in there. Whether he’s looking out at the cottage.
Is he thinking of me like I’m thinking of him?
Because he’s all I’ve thought about. Ever since that night in the dockyard. Ever since the light dimmed in his eyes when I told him Julian Young was his biological father. Ever since he was ripped away from me.
Gone.
Except I thought I would get him back. Once it was all sorted. Once the police had questioned him and realized it was all a mistake. That Dax is a good person. He was just protecting me. He was never going to shoot Julian.
But the cold bile settling low in my gut as I glance back at Logan’s face tells me…
I’m never getting him back.
That Dax Silver is gone. He disappeared that night. Died on the cold floor next to Julian’s two men.
“I’m sorry, Rose.” Logan shakes his head as I nod mutely and turn back to the window.
I thought being released and having all charges against him dropped would help. I thought coming back to the estate would help.
I prayed that coming back home would change whatever it is that’s keeping him from seeing me.
I blink my dry, stinging eyes as Logan speaks.
“He said to tell you he’s terminating your contract early.”
“What?” I whip around and gape at him. He looks as drained as I feel, the burden of having to deliver this news himself evident in the absence of his usual bright eyes and cheeky smile.
This whole situation is sucking the life out of all of us.
“He actually said that?”
Nausea rolls in my stomach, as Logan whispers, “I’m sorry, Rose.”
“He’s… it’s a shock. He’s still in shock. Jasmin said he’s meeting Alistair later. To talk. He’s thinking about that. And coming home. And…” My shoulders drop as I stare at Logan. “Why is he doing this?”
“I don’t know. I wish I did. Nothing makes sense.”
I turn back to the window again as Logan walks up behind me, his strong, warm body stopping behind me and bringing a sliver of comfort with it as it evokes a memory.
Dax wrapped me in his arms in this exact spot once. He buried his nose into my hair and inhaled. Breathed me in. Kissed my neck and whispered in my ear. Infinity.
The muscles in my back tense as I tear my eyes away from the main house and Dax’s bedroom window and spin to face Logan.
“How was he when you dropped him off? Is Jasmin there now? Or is he alone?”
“He’s alone, but…” Logan’s eye pinch at the corners.
He’s too nice to say it. Too nice to tell me not to go there, that Dax still doesn’t want to see me. Logan probably thinks I’ll cry. But he doesn’t know that I don’t ever cry.
Dax knows that.
At least the bastard knows I won’t be shedding any tears over him.
“Give him some time. He’ll get over whatever shit he’s got going on inside his head.”
“Time. Yeah,” I snort.
I appreciate Logan trying to make me feel better, I do. But the fact is, Dax has chosen to shut me out, for whatever reason. And being told to give him time? It’s like hearing my family telling me that’s all I needed, over and over again. I heard it for months… years… on repeat. But after everything, it wasn’t time that helped me.
It was Dax.
He made me feel calm for the first time in years. He taught me to let go. To stop blaming myself. He showed me how to forgive.
And now he’s treating me in a way I’m not sure I can ever forgive him for.
He’s shutting me out.
“He’s terminating your contract early.”
“Look. Let me make you a drink,” Logan says, his eyes raking over my pinched expression.
I shrug my shoulders. “Sure. Coffee, please.”
He places his keys and phone down on the coffee table as he heads down the hallway toward the kitchen.
I take a seat on the sofa as he moves around in the kitchen, fixing us both a drink.
The past two days I’ve survived on coffee. I couldn’t bring myself to eat. Every time my phone beeped, or someone knocked at the door, I thought it was Dax. Or, at least, news about Dax. A message from him. Confirmation that he was allowed visitors and had asked for me.
Something.
Anything.
But all I got was nothing. Nothing followed by more nothing.
Sophie came over when Jasmin and Logan were here. She said she was certain the charges against Dax would be dropped. But she wanted to understand more about the entire situation first.
She confirmed the DNA results. Julian Young is Dax’s biological father. Something I already knew, yet still made me want to throw up when I heard her say it. And she also told us that the guy at the dockyard, James, was an undercover cop. He’d been working as part of a team investigating serious and organized crime—specifically Julian Young and his business—for the past eighteen months. Apparently, James knew who Dax really was the entire time. Which makes no sense to me at all. How could an undercover cop allow a civilian with a vigilante revenge motive to get so close to a case like that and do nothing about it for months? But Sophie brushed off my concerns with confidence. Jasmin and Logan seemed happy with her explanation, or lack of one.
Maybe I’m overthinking it. My head’s been all over the place.
I pick up Logan’s keys, turning them over in my hands for something to do as he continues crashing about in the kitchen. I swear he can’t do anything quietly. I’d do anything to hear one of his funny dating app stories right now. Take me back to a time when things seemed normal. When I knew how it felt to laugh.
Before I found out my boyfriend’s grandparents anonymously paid off his dad to leave their daughter alone. They may have seen what Julian was capable of back then. But Jessica didn’t. Protecting their daughter cost them their relationship with her.
And their relationship with Dax and then Jasmin.
All that time they could have spent together… lost.
Lost because of secrets.
Lost because of lies.
Jasmin’s since learned from talking to Alistair that Julian met Al’s mom shortly after leaving Jessica. They married and had Alistair within a year. And Alistair’s mom came from a wealthy family. Julian used money from them to start his business. The business that’s now been seized as part of the criminal investigation against him. Thankfully, Alistair was only ever involved in the legitimate side of things, so the police have cleared him from any involvement. Alistair said Julian always had his eye on the Silver Estate. It’s another reason he and Jasmin kept their relationship a secret. Only, Julian knew somehow. He admitted as much in the dockyard. He probably thought it was a brilliant twist of fate in his favor that they fell for one another. He always planned to get the business somehow. Whether that was by getting Dax out of the picture with a jail stabbing, or some new plan for Jasmin, the thought of which makes my skin crawl and blood run cold.
That bastard will stop at nothing for what he wants. I saw it in his eyes that night. I felt it in his hands when they were on me, holding my face down against the hood of the car.
I wrap my arms around myself, rubbing my hands up and down my upper arms where goosebumps have formed. He didn’t do anything to me. Dax made sure of it. He could have been shot for trying to save me. He could have died in front of my eyes.
And now he can’t even bring himself to see me. I wish I knew what was going on in that confusing head of his.
Dax hot-and-cold Silver.
“Here you go.” Logan walks in and places the steaming mug in front of me on the table and scoops up his keys that I’ve placed back down, and his phone.
“You leaving?”
“I can come straight back. I just need to get some things for Dax.” He looks at me with guilt-ridden eyes.
“Oh.”
Dax could have asked me. It’s exactly what I could have done for him. I would have loved it. Picking up some things for him for when he comes home, stocking the fridge with things he likes, getting more fish food for his office.
I would have been excited to do it, knowing that I was about to get him back again.
“It’s fine.” I force a smile onto my face and stand to walk Logan to the door. “There’s no rush. Take as long as you need.”
“I’ll be an hour, max.” Logan steps through the front door.
He looks at me with uncertainty.
“Really. I’ll be fine.”
He takes in a deep breath, his brow furrowing, before he reaches out and squeezes my upper arm. “Call me if you need anything.”
“I will.”
He walks to his Range Rover and drives off.
I don’t even close the door before I’m striding out through it, my coffee forgotten.
The only fuel I need is the fire that’s started burning in my gut from Dax pushing me away. Canceling my contract. Who the hell does he think he is? At least have the guts to say it to my face. Whatever he’s going through, he can’t shut me out. He’s not the only one in this.
I curl my fingers around the jagged metal in my palm. Logan won’t miss his spare key to Dax’s apartment. Not yet anyway.
I’ve got an hour.
An hour to make Dax speak to me.
It’s plenty of time.
