Chapter 103
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Chapter 23
Amber was up before dawn, the house still heavy with the quiet of sleep. I wasn’t insomnia or any physical ailment that had woken her–just a gnawing unease in her gut that refused to let her rest. She needed to talk to someone, needed to voice the storm brewing inside her, and there was only one person she trusted to listen without judgment: her friend Danny, a doctor back in the States. She dialed his number, her fingers trembling slightly as she pressed the phone to her ear. There was safety in the stillness of the morning, the silence of the house. No one would overhear, and for now, that was the only thing keeping her together. She wasn’t ready to face Luca, not after everything.
Not yet.
As she sat by the window, cradling her phone, her conversation with Danny offered a brief reprieve from the chaos in her mind. He listened, as he always did, his voice soothing through the speaker. But even he couldn’t offer her the comfort she needed–because the truth was, she knew what she had to do. She had to come clean. To Nico, to Luca. But just the thought of it made her chest tighten with dread. Her world had already started to unravel, and she wasn’t sure she could survive the aftermath of what she needed to reveal.
Eventually, the call ended, and Amber drifted downstairs in search of coffee. The housekeeper, Gabriella, was already in the kitchen, bustling around, the smell of freshly brewed coffee filling the air. Amber offered her a weary smile, sitting at the dining table as she scrolled through her phone, trying to distract herself from the inevitable.
That’s when she noticed Gabriella pouring a second cup of coffee, adding to cubes of sugar–something that made Amber’s brow furrow with a strange sense of unease.
“I thought Luca hated sugar in his coffee,” she muttered, not even realizing she’d spoken aloud.
The housekeeper glanced at her with a bright smile. “Oh, this isn’t for Mr. De Santis. It’s for Ms. Forentino. She stayed here last night. Always takes two cubes. Quite the sweet tooth, she has.”
The words hit Amber like a punch to the gut, knocking the wind right out of her. Carlotta. Here. Last night. It felt like a switch had been flipped inside her, and everything she had been dreading was suddenly crashing down around her. She had told herself, time and time again, that she could handle it–that she knew Luca had moved on. She had even convinced herself that it was for the best, for everyone. But knowing it in the abstract and having it thrust in front of her like this–knowing that Carlotta had spent the night with Luca, perhaps in the same bed they had once shared–it was a different kind of pain. One that was sharp, brutal, and completely inescapable.
She excused herself hastily, her coffee left untouched, her hands shaking as she pushed away from the table. She had to get out of there. She couldn’t face them–Luca, Carlotta–together. Not now. Not ever.
But as fate would have it, she didn’t make it far. Just as she passed by the master bedroom, the door creaked open, and there stood Carlotta, dressed in nothing but a bathrobe, her hair tousled in a way that screamed of a night well spent, Amber’s heart shattered. Carlotta smiled, oblivious to the storm inside Amber.
“Good morning,” Carlotta greeted casually, her voice filled with a warmth Amber could hardly bear.
Amber couldn’t remember if she replied. She couldn’t remember if she said anything at all. All she could feel was the ground dropping out from under her, the searing pain that made her want to collapse right them in the hallway. Somehow, she made it back upstairs, shutting herself in her room as the tears she had been holding back finally broke free. She sank to the floor, curling into herself, her breath coming in ragged gasps. It was all still there–the memories, the love she thought she had buried. It was pulsing under her skin like a wound that refused
to heal.
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22:04 Sat, Feb 7 7
Chapter 103
The past she had run from was crashing back into her life, and there was escaping it now,
She wasn’t sure how much time passed before Nico came bounding into he room, holding up a broken sandal with a proud grin. “Mummy,
look! It broke!”
Amber blinked through her tears, forcing a smile for her son. “I see that, he murmured, her voice hollow. “Why don’t we go buy you a new
one?”
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Sara Lili is a daring romance writer who turns icy landscapes into scenes of fiery passion. She loves crafting hot love stories while embracing the chill of Iceland’s breathtaking cold.
