He Bought Her Truth

ation lamp, cruel in its honesty. She sat on the edge of Damien's leather sofa, wrapped in o

s traced the edges of the paper, delaying the inevitable. She'd heard her phone buzzing incessantly from the ki

e it

nt

me is

rtist Rowan Hart's Secret Pa

line did

as g

hold of her juvenile records, sealed documents that should have been impossible to access. The journalist had painted her therapist's notes about survivor's guilt as evidence of ma

painted her as a manipulative sur

id it ment

unity workshops, the teenagers she'd pulled back from the edge, t

rom someone inside Vale Inter

known how to make a t

amien, who sat in meetings with him, who knew about their relation

. She didn't h

ng inside h

he walls. She could make out fragments: "legal action," "breach of confidentiality," "find th

is hand. His usually immaculate appearance was disheveled-shirt wrinkled, tie loosened, hair fa

king up. "Someone close. Someone with access to

Vale, who trusted sparingly and loved even less

orway, studying his p

t her, star

ching a cliff's edge. "That someone in your company think

tched his face, searching for any flicker of doubt,

des, his hands finding her shoulders.

dn't a

oss newspaper pages like evidence in a trial, she couldn't help but question her own motives. Had sh

-

zing funds from her art foundation, schools backing out of programs she'd spent mont

withdrawn their commissions. The museum partnership she'd been cultivating for her next exhibition was "reassessing their po

alk to anyone. Not yet. Not when every word felt lik

e knew where

as just

as di

, dodging cameras, fielding threats from board members and investors. She could hear him through the walls-his vo

ouse that felt less like safety and

elt like home. Photographers had camped out on the street below, their telephoto lenses trained upwa

sanctuary wasn

she couldn't t

poken questions and careful politeness. They moved around each

forged contract, now accompanied by three articles from the past week. The

r voice steadier than she felt.

s bloodshot from staring at screens and reading

intended. "You're trying to protect you

mask he wore in boardrooms, the one that

d her ev

nce between them feeling li

me, his composure cracked. "T

ave

me come

he CEO facade to the man underneath-the one who'd held her through nightmares, who

hesi

ational. Not as dam

the first time in days, s

d already opened, carved by doubt and circumst

this alone,"

e walk

-

as dark when

the familiar ritual. This place had been her sanctuary for three years, t

turn on t

s that had once felt like air. The paintings looked different in the darkness-her portrai

e

e heard

o

l

ibe

heart hammering

edatory smile she remembered from seventeen years old, when the world h

carrying that familiar note of po

iffened. "I didn

nsive cologne-something different from what he'd wo

idn't

ction was palpable, radiating from him like heat. "

it," she replied, proud of

dying her like a specimen

-all the secrets, all the damage, all the careful

r teeth. "What

p calculated to intimidate. "You. Us. Together. Truth, Ro

ter. "You never wanted the

you to c

ion tasted like ash. "Lo

it a

N

d into hi

heart

wasn't

a flash

tried to escape. "This has everything. The forged contracts. The

g that it contained enough evidence to destroy what was left of her reputation,

mesmerized by its

return?" she asked, t

, slow and

sile

ted her to disappear, to stop fighting, to let

k a ste

hen a

aid, checking his watch with t

e table where she'd once s

hed into

didn't

the lights

e started, rain lashing agains

first time in ye

sn't s

dy to burn