Chapter 17
May 30, 2025
Celene’s POV…
There’s a kind of silence that doesn’t feel peaceful. It feels like I’m drowning. I hadn’t changed out of my blouse, my heels were kicked somewhere near the door, and I was curled up on the edge of the couch like someone had punched a hole through my chest. The wine I poured hours ago sat on the table, untouched. My lipstick had cracked. My hands still smelled like stress and too many paper handouts from a meeting I didn’t remember surviving.
My phone hadn’t buzzed all night. Not even spam wanted me. And the worst part? I understood. The article was still open on my laptop, mocking me in harsh font. PR Puppet. Strategic Placement. Fernand’s Safety Net. Not “leader.” Not “visionary.” Just a placeholder in red lipstick.
And suddenly, I wasn’t CEO anymore. I was that girl again. The girl people whispered about behind glass doors. The one they let sit at the table just long enough to look diverse, then quietly nudged out when she spoke too loud. Too opinionated. Too much. My hands were shaking, and I hated that they were. Because I was Celene Monroe. Wasn’t I?
I barely registered the knock. It started soft. Barely there. Then louder. A pause. Then another knock. Firmer. I thought about ignoring it. Whoever it was could go to hell with the rest of the headlines. But I stood up anyway. And when I opened the door, I forgot how to breathe.
Damon Ashcroft stood there, hair a mess, sleeves rolled, coat half-off his shoulder like he hadn’t stopped moving since he read the same headlines that broke me. He didn’t say anything at first. Just lifted the bottle of wine I liked and gave a quiet, steady look that didn’t ask if he could come in. It told me he was already here.
“You looked like you needed backup,” he said, his voice lower than usual. Not sharp. Not sarcastic. Real. I stepped aside without a word, too tired to pretend I didn’t want him there.
He moved like he’d done this before. Kicked off his shoes by the door, uncorked the wine without asking, poured two glasses like it was the most natural thing in the world. He handed me one. I didn’t take it. I just sat back down, legs folded under me, arms wrapped around my middle like I was trying to keep something from spilling out.
Damon set his glass on the coffee table and sat next to me. Close. Too close. But I didn’t pull away. The silence that sat between us wasn’t comfortable. But it wasn’t cold either. It was thick. Heavy. Unspoken things pressed against my chest. I stared ahead, eyes burning, jaw clenched.
Then finally, voice small, I said, “Why did you defend me today?”
He looked over. “You’re really asking me that?”
I swallowed hard. “You could’ve let me sink.”
His jaw flexed. “You think I’d do that?”
“You think anyone else in that room wouldn’t have?” His answer came fast, but not loud.
“I don’t care what they think. I care what you do.”
I blinked, throat tightening again. “They think I’m just a symbol. A placeholder. They look at me like I’m… borrowed time in designer heels.” He didn’t try to soften it. Didn’t contradict the words. He let them sit.
Then he said, “You’ve been through worse.” I flinched.
He leaned in. “You’ve survived worse.”
“Then why does this feel like breaking?”
“Because it always does when you get back up,” he said quietly. “That’s what makes it different. You don’t need them to believe in you. You never did.” His voice dropped lower, closer.
“You built this with hands they don’t understand. You bled for this in ways they’ll never see.” I turned toward him, face warm, tears dangerously close. And for once, he didn’t look away.
He reached out, slow, measured, and brushed a strand of hair behind my ear like he wasn’t sure if I’d let him. I did. I didn’t speak. Couldn’t. But I leaned into that touch. And when my fingers found his wrist, I felt him tense. Not from rejection. From restraint.
“Celene,” he murmured. My name didn’t sound like a warning. It sounded like a promise. I leaned in. Barely. But he closed the distance. His lips brushed mine, slow, steady, and full of everything we’d swallowed for weeks. Tension. Rage. Want.
I opened for him, and he exhaled like he hadn’t breathed until now. My fingers curled into the front of his shirt. His hand slid into my hair. The kiss deepened fast. Desperate. Hot.
His tongue pushed into my mouth, claiming, tasting, like he needed to devour every inch of me. His hand moved fast, fisting my blouse, pulling it open until buttons scattered on the floor. His palm cupped my breast, squeezing hard through my bra until I whimpered.
“You have no idea how long I’ve wanted this,” he growled into my neck, dragging his mouth down, sucking hard enough to mark. “Wanted you. Like this. My hips rolled up against him and he groaned, grinding back, his cock already hard and pressing against me through our clothes.
He didn’t undress me gently. He yanked my skirt up, shoved my panties aside, fingers sliding through my pussy like he was testing how wet I already was “Fuck,” he muttered. “You’re soaked for me.”
I gasped as two fingers pushed inside, pumping rough and steady, his thumb rubbing my clit with just enough pressure to make my thighs twitch. “Want me to stop?” he said, voice dark, teasing. I grabbed his belt, yanking it open with shaking hands.
“Shut up and fuck me.”
He didn’t make me say it twice. He stood just long enough to strip, then came back down on top of me, cock thick and flushed and already leaking at the tip. He dragged it against my pussy, teasing the entrance, then pushed inside in one deep, hungry thrust.
“Jesus- fuck-” he hissed, slamming in deeper. “You feel too fucking good. Tight little pussy just swallowing me. I cried out, back arching, nails clawing down his back as he started to move. Hard. Deep. Each thrust brutal and perfect, his body pinning me down like he was claiming me.
“You wanted this,” he growled in my ear. “Wanted me to pound this pussy, didn’t you?” I moaned shamelessly, wrapping my legs around him, taking every brutal thrust like I needed it to stay sane.
“I’m gonna fuck you so hard you forget all their names,” he snarled, slamming into me again and again. “The only name you’ll remember is mine.”
And it was. Over and over. I said his name like it was the only thing keeping me breathing. And when we came, shaking, sweating, gasping, it felt like something cracked open and spilled between us. Not love. Not yet. But something real. Something we weren’t going to take back.
Chapter 18
May 30, 2025
Celene’s POV…
I woke up in a panic. Not the cute, stretch-and-sigh kind. The ‘holy shit, I have a board meeting in an hour’ kind. I sat up so fast I got dizzy, sheets tangling around my legs, hair an actual disaster.
“Oh my God,” I muttered, blinking at the sun flooding through the floor-to-ceiling windows. “We’re late. I’m late. Why didn’t the alarm go off?”
And then I turned, and nearly screamed. Because Damon Ashcroft was very much in my bed. Shirtless. Asleep. And somehow still smug-looking.
“Damon!” I hissed, swatting his shoulder. “Wake up! Get up! We’re late!”
He blinked once. Slowly. Like this wasn’t a catastrophe. “What time is it?”
“Too late for you to be this calm,” I snapped, already sliding out of bed, half-hopping into my skirt.
I grabbed my blouse from the floor, ignoring how scandalously wrinkled it was, then stormed toward the bathroom, barefoot, braless, still in a state of ‘how did we end up naked and tangled and…oh right.’ I slammed the door behind me, nearly tripped on my own heels, then stared at myself in the mirror. Lipstick smudged. Neck… marked. Damn it.
Twenty minutes later, I walked out of that bathroom reborn. Hair slicked back into a sleek bun. A red dress so sharp it could cut egos. Gold accents. Heels that sounded like power every time they hit marble. And Damon, still lounging in bed, watching me like he hadn’t just rearranged my entire life twelve hours ago. His eyes dragged down my body, slow, unapologetic. I smirked.
“What?” I asked, grabbing my earrings.
He just tilted his head. “You clean up nice. You always dress like vengeance after sex?”
I raised a brow. “You always act surprised?”
He sat up, lazy and lethal. “I’m not surprised. Just impressed. Especially by the whole panic-to-villain arc you just pulled in under half an hour.” I smiled, unapologetically wicked.
“You know,” I said, stepping closer, “for someone who claimed to despise me, you had a pretty hard time keeping your hands off me last night.” He didn’t flinch. Didn’t blink.
“Funny,” he said, standing now, bare chest and all. “I was about to say the same thing.”
I lifted my chin. “Maybe I was just curious.”
“And now?” I took a slow step toward him, brushing imaginary lint off his shoulder.
“Now?” I said, lips close to his ear. “I’m in charge of this little game. Try to keep up.” He caught my wrist gently. Looked me dead in the eye.
“So you’re ready now?” he asked, voice low. “To walk in there. To face them. To take everything they swore you couldn’t?”
My smile faded, but not from fear. From fire. “Who told you I wasn’t ready?” He didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Just stared.
Damon told me to stop caring what they thought. And maybe for the first time in my life, I listened. The headlines? Noise. The whispers? Background static. If I let them define me, I’d always be climbing out of someone else’s opinion. I’m done doing that. Because I realized something in the wreckage: some people exist just to see you break.
But me? I was never built to break quietly. The second I stepped through the doors, everything stilled. Like the air itself hesitated. All eyes turned. Not to Damon Ashcroft, though he cut a striking figure beside me in that dark suit, tie loosened just enough to make women glance twice. No, they were looking at me.
The girl they underestimated. The CEO they called a placeholder. The ex-wife they thought would fold. Wrapped in a red silk dress that hugged every inch of a body they once called decorative. A slit up to my thigh. Back bare. Shoulders squared like they carried something more dangerous than charm, intention. And I wore that intention like perfume.
“Red?” Damon said under his breath, eyes scanning the room. “You came to set something on fire?” I didn’t smile. Not yet.
I just said, “No point coming if you don’t leave a burn mark.”
The whispers started as soon as we hit the main floor.
“She looks… different.”
“That’s Celene Monroe?”
“I thought she’d left after the scandal.”
Oh, I heard them. I let them echo. Let them travel like wildfire under my heels as I walked straight toward the crowd that once looked through me. Damon kept beside me, never an inch ahead, never behind. He didn’t hover. He didn’t instruct. He let me lead. And for once? I felt what power actually looked like.Not borrowed but owned. An investor approached us, gray hair, sharp suit, the kind of man who used to shake Rhys’s hand and ignore mine.
“Celene,” he said, visibly recalibrating as he took in the gown. “You’ve… certainly made an impression.”
I tilted my head. “That’s what women in power do.”
He laughed awkwardly. “Of course. Of course.” Damon didn’t say a word. Just sipped his drink and let me handle it. Because I could. Because he knew I didn’t need saving. Tss. Someone’s feel cocky.
And then I felt someone’s eyes on me. That stare is heavy, bruising and familiar. I didn’t even have to look. But I did because that’s fun. Rhys stood on the far side of the ballroom, tie loose, jaw locked, eyes burning straight into mine. And he looked….wrecked.
Like he hadn’t slept in days. Like the realization of who I’d become without him hit him square in the chest and knocked the breath from his lungs. He didn’t blink, didn’t move. His gaze trailed from my collarbone to the slit in my dress. To the way Damon leaned in when I whispered something about the catering being beneath us. And I saw it all. The jealousy. The ache. The regret. Like I was his ghost, except I wasn’t haunting him. I was thriving. That’s it Rhys. Look at what you have lost.
“Your ex-husband’s going to implode,” Damon muttered in my ear as I turned from Rhys’s stare.
“He already did,” I replied. “He just hasn’t admitted it yet.”
Damon’s eyes flicked to mine. “You’re terrifying tonight.”
I smirked. “And you like it.” His gaze dropped briefly, to my lips. Then to my neckline. Then right back up to meet mine.
“I do.” his lips touched my ears for a couple of seconds. I bit my lips as my body heated.
The air thickened. But I didn’t let it consume me. I had something better than heat tonight. I had control. We moved toward the center of the ballroom. More handshakes. More toasts. More moments where people who once doubted me tried to realign their loyalty mid-sentence.
I let them. Let them stumble over their praise. Let them see what it looked like to bet on the wrong woman and lose. And when Damon gently placed his hand on the small of my back to guide me forward through the crowd, I didn’t flinch.
I leaned into it. Not for show. Not for him. For me. Because that touch said what I already knew, I wasn’t just the woman Rhys lost. I was the woman they’d all remember. In red. In heels. With fire in her eyes. And no apologies left to give.
Chapter 19
May 30, 2025
The ballroom was thick with applause, champagne, and stares that felt more like inventory than admiration. I could smile through strategy. I could play heir and CEO and survivor in heels that hurt. But sometimes, even queens need to breathe.
I slipped out the terrace doors. The cold slapped me awake. I let it. The wind pulled at the hem of my red dress, kissed the sweat at the base of my neck, reminded me I was still real beneath all the armor. One deep breath. That’s all I needed. But then I heard him. The footsteps. Measured. Familiar. Uninvited. I didn’t have to look.
“Don’t,” I said flatly, eyes still on the skyline. “Not tonight.”
“You never looked at me like that,” Rhys said, voice low. Bitter. Bruised. I closed my eyes. So it was going to be that kind of night.
“You never looked at anyone like that,” he added. “Not even me.”
I turned slowly, letting him see exactly what he no longer had access to. “And whose fault is that?”
He stepped closer. “The way you looked at Ashcroft—”
“Stop,” I warned.
“Is that how you see him now? Is that who you needed to become this?”
I didn’t flinch. “You don’t get to ask me what I need.”
“You looked at him like he mattered. Like he saw you.”
I laughed. Cold. Sharp. “Because he did. And you never did.” He blinked. Just once. I could almost see the gears turning, trying to reshape the version of me he thought he still knew.
“You’re twisting this,” he said.
“No, Rhys. I’m finally saying it. You were in love with a version of me that kept quiet. That didn’t challenge you. That dimmed herself just to survive your spotlight. And I’m done pretending that version of me was real.”
“You were my wife,” he said, stepping closer. “You chose me.”
“And you discarded me.”
He looked down, jaw twitching. Then, suddenly, without warning, he grabbed my wrist.
“I still remember what it was like,” he said, breath thick with something desperate.
I yanked my hand back. “Let me go.”
“I never stopped wanting you, Celene,” he whispered, stepping in, his hands now at my arms. “You were mine.” Before I could step away, he leaned in. His lips crashed toward mine, uninvited, unwanted.
I shoved him back, hard. “Don’t you dare.”
But he caught my arm again, tighter this time, trying to close the space I’d already burned down. And that’s when instinct kicked in, I didn’t think. I just moved. My heel pivoted. My elbow jabbed straight into his gut. He grunted. I followed it with a quick twist of his wrist and shoved him backward. He stumbled against the stone railing, eyes wide.
“Touch me again,” I said, chest heaving, “and I’ll make sure you leave with a limp.”
A sound behind us broke the tension. Damon. Standing at the terrace doorway. Watching everything. His expression didn’t move, but his eyes? They burned. Not with anger. With pride. And something sharper. He started to step forward, but I raised a hand.
“I’ve got it.”
Rhys looked between us, one hand still on his chest. “So this is who you are now?” I brushed my hair back into place, fixed the strap of my dress, and turned toward the ballroom.
“This is who I’ve always been. You just never earned the right to see it.” As I passed Damon, he didn’t say a word. He just looked at me. Like he wanted to clap.
I smirked. “What? Surprised?”
He gave a low chuckle. “Hmmm, you look so hot.”
Then he grabbed my wrist and pulled me into the shadows, past the terrace, down a hallway, into a quiet, unused corner where the walls couldn’t talk. I didn’t protest. I didn’t need to.
The heat in my body did all the work. My back hit the wall, his mouth crashed into mine. He groaned as he kissed me hard, one hand gripping my thigh and yanking it up around his waist, the other already sliding up my dress.
“I wanted to fuck you all night,” he growled into my mouth. “And now I’m not holding back.” He yanked my panties to the side and drove two fingers into my pussy, fast and rough, curling them just right until my hips bucked against his hand.
“God, you’re so fucking wet,” he muttered. “You like when I watch you handle assholes like him? You get off on putting men in their place?”
I moaned, biting his shoulder. “I get off on you.”
He unzipped just enough to pull his cock out, thick, hard, angry, and dragged it against my slick folds. No teasing. No asking. Just raw hunger. He lifted my other leg up and slammed into me in one brutal thrust.
“Oh fuck-” I gasped, head falling back, nails digging into his arms.
“That’s right,” he growled, pounding into me. “Take this cock. Let everyone hear how good I fuck you.”
His thrusts were hard, deep, relentless. The kind of fucking that didn’t need romance. It needed rage and want and payback. My heels were off the ground, back scraping the wall with every slam of his hips. He was growling my name between kisses, his mouth on my neck, my shoulder, my lips. I clung to him, wrapped around him, drowning in the heat, the filth, the way his cock filled me so fucking deep I could barely think.
“You’re mine,” he hissed. “And no one’s ever gonna touch this pussy again.”
“Damon- fuck- harder-” I begged, and he gave it to me, slamming in faster, so deep I saw stars.
We came like animals, loud, messy, desperate. My pussy clenched around him so tight he cursed against my throat, his cum spilling inside me in thick, pulsing waves. He held me there for a second, breathing hard, forehead pressed to mine.
