The morning after the storm came too quiet.
The kind of quiet that makes men uneasy.
Christopher Cross sat behind the broad mahogany desk of his office, his fingers drumming lightly on a sealed document he hadn't read in over an hour. The sun filtered through the tall windows in thin, reluctant shafts — pale light fighting the stubborn weight of fog outside.
He had always loved the fog. It softened the sharp edges of the city, made even ruin look dignified.
But today, it only felt like a curtain — something drawn to hide the truth that the air itself had changed.
Serena hadn't come.
Not since their last encounter — the one that had left him both sated and unsatisfied, the taste of her still in his mouth, her quiet submission carved into his memory.
He told himself he didn't care. That her silence was expected.
And yet, every knock on his door stirred something taut beneath his ribs — a fleeting hope, immediately crushed.
