Jade stumbled into the kitchen at eleven in the morning, her hair disheveled and extra wavy. She slept in my T-shirt, and it was long enough to almost reach her knees, drowning her emaciated body. She tiptoed toward me, and I could clearly see it: thehappinessin her eyes.
Jade.Was. Beside. Me. Again.
“Good morning, Malyshka.”
“Baby...” She snaked her arms around my torso and pressed into me, sighing loudly. “You’re here.”
It was the same as last night; she kept checking that I was beside her, like she was reassuring herself.
Last night.
Last night, we found each other again.
Last night, we made love. Slow, hesitant, and passionate.
Last night, we talked about everything. About her time with Xavier, about Gianna, about her father, and about…the video. We didn’t just talk about it—we watched it, and it was both painful and healing. Like a glimpse into another lifetime.
I breathed Jade in, looking her over in the morning light. God, I couldn’t believe that Jade was real,mine,and with me. That the house smelled like her again, still filled with seashells.
She sat on my lap during breakfast, and I fed her, making sure she ate enough, and, in turn, she gifted me her butterfly kisses. On my lips, on my cheeks, on my shoulders, on my hands. And every kiss was medicine.
Every minute with her was drowning the black void still inside me. The sound of her voice, the feel of her skin, the look in her eyes—it was healing me faster than all those long weeks in the hospital.
“Alex?” I loved it when she started the sentence with my name. “We still have one more person who…”
She trailed off, but no words were needed. I nodded, bringing another forkful to her mouth, and she chewed diligently.
“I think the original plan will still work. We can’t really use the video that’s out there, but we can make new ones.”
“What was the original plan?” I asked, my heart sinking at the realization that the details were still hazy in my mind.
I closed my eyes momentarily, thinking back to that night before it all happened. Jade proposed we make a sex tape, yes, but was there more?
“I-I mentioned that I wanted to make an OnlyFans account,” Jade cleared her throat, catching onto the fact that I couldn’t remember everything. “And then send my letter of resignation with that link. I’d need Cindy and Julian’s help—to get email addresses, and maybe you can hack into his account again?”
And that’s when it all slowly descended on me. Yes. Jade was my criminal mastermind. She wanted to embarrass her father—do something irreversible and irredeemable in his eyes, so it wasn’t just one video.
“Yes,” I assured her, admiring the color of her eyes. “I can do it. You want to film it all here?”
Jade nodded slowly, watching me closely.
“You still want to be my…whore?” I whispered, and Jade melted into a smile, knowing that all the memories had returned.
“Only yours.”
The ringtone sounded on speaker while Jade sat with my laptop open in front of her. She was calling Julian, and the phone rang and rang until, finally, the fucker picked up.
“Jade?” He sounded so surprised.
“Hi, Julian,” Jade spoke cheerily, and I hated Julian just for the simple fact that he knew her. “Sorry to call you out of the blue like this, but…I need a favor.” Jade’s voice noticeably softened as she shifted closer to the phone.
“Oh yeah? What kind?”
“Um…" Jade bit her bottom lip and looked up at me. “I was hoping you could take a look at a draft brief I have for Pavlov? Just to make sure I have everything?” Jade scrunched up in the chair, uncertain of her words. “I know I’m not supposed to ask you, and Iknowthat this looks bad and it has nothing to do with you now, but I haven’t been to work in three months, and I just needsomeone’shelp—” Jade took a short breath in but continued quickly, “—and I thought that maybe, since things are so different now, maybe you could hel—"
“Yeah, Jade. No problem,” Julian interrupted her speechsokindly. “I’m happy to help you. Want to email me?”
Jade sat up and grinned. “Oh my God,” she gushed. “Thank youso much,Julian!”
