Rowan
Every day blurred into the next like a punishment I couldn't escape.
I kept waiting for Channel.
Waiting for her to show up at my gates, trembling, breaking, begging-eyes wet with regret as she finally realized there was nowhere left to run. I imagined her collapsing on her knees, her voice shaking as she asked for mercy, for time, for anything.
And I would have given it to her.
Not because she deserved it.
Because I wanted her close.
That was the part I hated admitting.
A month and two weeks had passed.
No Channel.
No trace.
No whisper.
Just silence that pressed against my skull until it felt like madness.
I stood by the window of my study, staring at nothing in particular, hands clenched behind my back. My mansion had never felt this large-or this empty.
"Boss Rowan," a voice called from the doorway.
I didn't turn.
"Don't come in here without her-alive or dead," I said flatly. It was the same order I had given for weeks.
No one had brought anything useful.
No one had found her.
And that terrified me more than I wanted to admit.
Three weeks of private investigators. Three weeks of dead ends, missing trails, and silence that didn't make sense for someone like Channel-someone who always ended up somewhere, even if it was the wrong place.
"Where could she be?" I muttered to myself, voice tightening. "Where did she go?"
Anger flared, sharp and sudden, choking my throat.
Then something worse followed.
Fear.
Because the last time I saw her clearly... she had been on that bridge.
The image hit me like a strike.
Her standing at the edge. Wind pulling at her clothes. Refusing to turn back.
I jolted upright so fast my chair scraped hard against the floor.
"No..." I whispered.
The thought came like poison.
Had she done it?
Had Channel really ended everything?
My chest tightened violently.
I grabbed my coat and stormed out of the study.
I didn't think.
I just moved.
My car engine roared to life, but before I could reverse out of the driveway, another vehicle cut across my path.
A blue sedan.
Rachel.
And my mother.
My grip tightened on the steering wheel.
Not now.
Not them.
I leaned out of the window, my voice sharp. "I don't have time for pointless conversations. Move."
Rachel stepped out of the passenger side, calm-too calm.
"Get out of the car, Rowan," she said. "We have news."
"Move," I repeated, louder this time.
Then my mother's voice cut through.
"Get back inside the house."
It wasn't loud.
It didn't need to be.
It carried weight-control.
"I have something to say," she added. "About Channel."
My body froze for half a second.
Then I stepped out.
Within minutes, I was back inside the mansion I barely recognized as mine anymore.
I didn't sit.
I couldn't.
"Speak," I said tightly, eyes locked on Rachel.
She sat down slowly on the sofa.
That sofa.
The one I had ordered specifically for Channel because she once mentioned she liked soft things when she was tired.
The memory made something twist in my chest.
Rachel noticed my stare and smirked faintly.
"I'll say it quickly," she said. "Channel is dead."
The words didn't land immediately.
My brain rejected them.
"What...?" My voice came out lower than intended.
Rachel reached into her folder and dropped several photos onto the table.
"I assume you'll want proof."
I moved before I even realized it.
My hands grabbed the photos.
And the world tilted.
Images.
Blurry. Disturbing. Suggestive.
A woman-her face partially hidden-caught in compromising positions with a man I didn't recognize.
My breathing stopped.
I couldn't see her face clearly.
But I saw enough.
The body shape.
The posture.
The familiarity that made my stomach turn violently.
"No..." I whispered again, but weaker this time.
My fingers tightened around the edges of the photos until they bent.
"That's her," Rachel said coldly. "Or what's left of her reputation."
My vision blurred.
Heat surged up my spine.
Something in me snapped.
I dropped to my knees without realizing it.
The impact barely registered.
My mind was too busy collapsing.
This couldn't be real.
Not Channel.
Not her.
Not like this.
I slammed my fist into the marble floor.
Once.
Twice.
Pain shot up my arm, but it wasn't enough to match what was inside me.
"Rowan-" my mother started.
"Don't," I growled.
My voice broke halfway.
I hit the floor again.
Harder.
The rage that followed wasn't clean-it was messy, choking, suffocating.
Betrayal.
Disgust.
Grief.
All colliding in my chest at once.
I turned my face away and vomited onto the floor.
Silence followed.
Then footsteps.
My mother's hand rested on my back. "Calm down."
Rachel sighed sharply. "Clean this up."
But I barely heard them.
My eyes were still fixed on the photos.
My mind refused to accept them yet, refused to let them go.
If Channel was alive...
Then this was what she had become?
My throat tightened painfully.
"I hate her," I whispered. "I hate her..."
But it didn't feel true.
Not fully.
Because hatred that strong shouldn't hurt this much.
They helped me upstairs.
I didn't resist.
My legs felt like they belonged to someone else.
My body collapsed onto the bed, but my mind stayed standing-trapped in the images, replaying them over and over again until they lost meaning.
Or maybe I was losing meaning.
Time passed strangely.
Minutes or hours-I couldn't tell.
Then Rachel entered again.
She didn't knock.
Of course she didn't.
"I forgot to mention something," she said casually.
My eyes lifted slowly.
"What now?"
She tilted her head.
"Oh," she said. "You didn't know?"
My heart tightened again for no reason I could explain.
My mother stepped in behind her, expression unreadable.
Rachel smiled.
"Channel might have been pregnant."
The room stopped breathing.
Even the air went still.
My body jerked upright so fast my head spun.
"What did you say?"
Rachel's smile widened slightly.
"And according to the report," she continued slowly, savoring it, "she claimed you were the father."
A long silence followed before Rachel's voice broke it again.
"It doesn't matter now. She's dead already, and so is the baby," she said carelessly, her tone void of emotions.
Then something inside me cracked-not loudly, not dramatically.
Quietly.
Deeply.
Wrongly.
Because suddenly, the photos didn't matter as much as the possibility that she had been carrying something... something that belonged to me.
My fingers went numb.
"No," I said immediately.
But my voice wasn't strong.
It was uncertain.
Rachel watched me carefully now, like she was waiting for something.
My mother didn't speak.
And in that silence, one thought rose slowly inside my mind like a shadow stretching across a wall.
If Channel was truly dead...with my baby...
Why did it feel like this wasn't the end of her story?
And why, suddenly, did I feel like I had just lost something I never even knew I still had?
Something important.
Something irreversible.
Something that was still not finished.
