The text came at 3:47 PM.
*Flight landed early. Home by 6. Can't wait to see you both! — Mom*
Amaya stared at her phone, her stomach dropping even as her pulse quickened. Three hours. Her mother would be home in three hours, expecting dinner and normalcy and the illusion that nothing had changed while she was sipping wine in Tuscany.
But everything had changed.
Amaya found him in his study, the same room where he'd first tried to lock her out, now transformed into their sanctuary.
He sat in the leather chair, whiskey in hand, his posture rigid with the tension that had been building for days — the knowledge that their stolen time was ending, that reality was returning, that they would have to pretend again.
"She's coming home early," Amaya said, her voice steady despite her racing h
