Chapter 100\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018I\u2019m home.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
42%2\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cGood. And congratulations, by the way. Heard what you did to that narcissist at our mating ceremony. I\u2019ve never been more proud of you. The weight Id been carrying on my shoulders seemed to lift a little.\u00a0<\/p>\n
We talked for what felt like minutes but turned into hours. I told him about rejecting Daxon, about losing the baby, about everything that had happened\u00a0<\/p>\n
since I\u2019d shut him out of my life.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He told me about his mate, someone he described as \u201ca complete surprise but the best kind.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re invited to our mating ceremony,\u201d he said near the end of our conversation And here\u2019s the good news, it\u2019s not happening in London. We\u2019re doing it\u00a0<\/p>\n
here, actually. I\u2019m planning to relocate to my family\u2019s house with my mate.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018Really? That\u2019s amazing, Drake.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI know, right? Oh, and before I forget, Amelia\u2019s been asking about you constantly Want her number?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
I did want it. I wanted to rebuild all the connections I\u2019d let Daxon tear apart.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When we finally hung up, I realized we\u2019d been talking for three hours. Drake, whold claimed to be busy, had spent his entire afternoon listening to me process my life. That was friendship.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Tristan still wasn\u2019t back.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I tried to tell myself I didn\u2019t care. He had his own life, his own problems to deal with. Just because we\u2019d slept together didn\u2019t mean I owned his time.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I called Leah instead, and she agreed to meet me for an impromptu training session.\u00a0<\/p>\n
We found a secluded spot away from her usual gym, and she put me through two hours of the most intense workout I\u2019d ever experienced.\u00a0<\/p>\n
My muscles screamed and my lungs burned, but it felt good to push my body, to focus on something other than where Tristan might be.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Afterward, she invited me to her place, and I stayed until evening, helping her plan wedding details and pretending I wasn\u2019t checking my phone every few\u00a0<\/p>\n
minutes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I thought about going to Orion\u2019s, but he\u2019d ask where Tristan was,\u00a0<\/p>\n
and I didn\u2019t have an answer.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t want to admit that the man who\u2019d sworn to protect me had disappeared ithout a word the morning after we\u2019d done something we couldn\u2019t say.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When I got home at nine that night, the house felt eerily quiet. Tristan\u2019s bike wasn\u2019t in the driveway. It was like he\u2019d never existed at all.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I lay in bed staring at the ceiling, trying not to think about how empty the space beside me felt. Tomorrow was Monday, and I\u2019d have to face Orion at work.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He\u2019d be back from his family emergency, and we\u2019d all be together again. I needed to look like I had my life together, not like I\u2019d spent the day wondering if I\u2019d imagined the connection I thought I\u2019d felt with Tristan.\u00a0<\/p>\n
At exactly six in the morning, I heard the familiar rumble of his motorcycle pull into the driveway. Something inside my chest loosened with relief, even though I was still hurt that he\u2019d left without saying anything.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I told myself I wasn\u2019t going downstairs. I told myself I\u2019d let him come to me, letim explain where he\u2019d been for almost twenty\u2013four hours.\u00a0<\/p>\n
|||\u00a0<\/p>\n
r\u00a0<\/p>\n
1\/2\u00a0<\/p>\n
19:40 Tue, Jan 6 =\u00a0<\/p>\n
Chapter 100\u00a0<\/p>\n
But my feet carried me down the stairs anyway, drawn by something I didn\u2019t want to name.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I found him in the entryway, he was swaying slightly, like he couldn\u2019t quite find his balance, and I knew immediately that he was drunk.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cTristan?\u201d I said softly, reaching out to steady him.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He jerked away from my touch like it burned him. \u2018Get the fuck away from me.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Everything inside me froze, my blood turning to ice in my veins.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Memories Drifted Into Soft Silence by Kyx Frost 100 Chapter 100\u00a0 \u2018I\u2019m home.\u201d\u00a0 42%2\u00a0 \u201cGood. And congratulations, by the way. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[77],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26257","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-second-gear-of-love-novel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26257","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26257"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26257\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26257"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26257"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kezpres.xyz\/novelreading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26257"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}