Chapter 108 Ghosts In The Mirror
Chapter 108 Ghosts In The Mirror
JULIAN
The hotel room had started to feel like a confessional booth for sins I hadn’t fully committed yet.
Two weeks left on the contract, and I was unraveling in slow, agonizing increments. The separation from Rosemary had carved out a hollow space in my chest that nothing — not work, not whiskey, not the endless cycle of guilt and longing — could fill. I stood at the window, staring at the Paris skyline like it might offer forgiveness, when my phone buzzed with another message from the unknown number.
This time, it wasn’t a photo or a video.
It was a simple text:
Meet me at the café on Rue de Rivoli. 9 PM. Come alone. - Sarah
My blood ran cold.
Sarah.
The ex who had walked away. The distant cousin who had once represented safety and simplicity. The woman who had been feeding me evidence of Rosemary’s past as Scarlet.
I went.
The café was quiet, tucked away from the main tourist flow. Sarah sat at a corner table, elegant in a tailored coat, her expression a careful mask of composure. The moment I sat down, the air between us thickened with history and unresolved pain.
“You,” I said, voice low. “All this time, it was you sending me those videos. Those photos. Why?”
Sarah’s eyes flickered with something raw — jealousy, regret, a bitterness that had been festering for months.
“Because I got jealous,” she admitted, voice barely above a whisper. “I saw how deeply you fell for her. How you were actually trying to change. How you were making real effort to be good to Rosemary in ways you never did for me. I was the one who left, yes. But seeing you fight for her… it broke something in me. I wanted you to see her the way I saw her — flawed. Human. Not this perfect heiress who stole you from me.”
The confession hung between us, heavy and ugly.
I leaned back, running a hand through my hair. “So you decided to destroy us instead? Feeding me her past like ammunition?”
Sarah’s eyes glistened. “I wanted you to open your eyes. To realize she wasn’t worth it. That maybe… you’d come back to what we had.”
The argument escalated quickly, voices low but sharp, accusations flying across the small table. I called her out for her pettiness. She threw my years of emotional unavailability back in my face. The old wounds reopened, raw and bleeding.
Then, without warning, Sarah’s expression shifted.
She slid from her chair and dropped to her knees beneath the table, hidden from view by the long tablecloth. Before I could react, she had my belt open, my cock freed, and her mouth around me in one smooth, practiced motion.
“Sarah—” I gasped, gripping the edge of the table.
She sucked me with desperate hunger, tongue swirling, taking me deep until I hit the back of her throat. The pleasure was immediate and overwhelming, a filthy contrast to the emotional storm still raging between us. I lasted only a few minutes before I came hard, spilling across her chest with a stifled groan.
She wiped her lips, looking up at me with a mixture of triumph and sadness.
I felt horrified.
Not because of the act itself, but because of how little it meant. How empty it felt compared to even the angriest, most complicated moments with Rosemary.
Sarah stood, straightening her coat. “Think about what you really want, Julian. Before it’s too late.”
She left without another word.
I sat there alone, the taste of betrayal bitter on my tongue, wondering how much further I could fall before there was nothing left to save.
ROSEMARY
Back in the penthouse, I stared at the latest message from the texter — Patricia.
He’s closer to breaking than you think. But be careful. Some truths don’t just hurt. They destroy.
I didn’t reply.
Instead, I poured myself a glass of wine and stood at the window, the city lights blurring into streaks of gold through unshed tears.
Two weeks left.
And I was starting to wonder if the end of the contract would be a mercy… or the beginning of a pain I wasn’t sure I could survive.