The memory between us.
Eliza’s POV
The photograph haunted her.
That night, sleep refused to come. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw the boy in the frame, his face overlapping with the one she’d carried in her locket all her life.
Alexander
It couldn’t be him.
And yet, it was.
The memories came in flashes: a hand tugging hers through a storm, the smell of smoke, the blinding sound of metal twisting. Then nothing. Just darkness and pain.
She’d been in an accident, but she didn’t know about the details; they were blurry and buried somewhere too deep to reach. A stranger, a kind woman named Martha, prayed for a child, so she found Eliza, who had been called Lisha before, changed her name, and failed to report the missing girl. Martha is dead now, and there's no one to tell the truth. Martha had found her on the roadside and taken her in. Eliza had woken in a hospital bed, her head bandaged, her name forgotten. The police never found her.
All she had was that small silver locket with two children smiling at the camera. She’d kept it close all her life, a piece of a story she couldn’t remember.
Now she knew why that photograph in Alexander’s study had felt like a knife to the heart.
She pressed the locket into her chest, whispering to the empty room, “Who are you to me?”
Alexander’s POV
The following week, Alexander traveled to New York for the launch of a project. Usually, travel meant clarity, a reprieve from the routines that tethered him. But this time, he couldn’t focus.
Every meeting blurred. Every conversation felt hollow.
He missed her.
He missed the way her voice softened the air, the quiet strength she carried through the halls, the way she somehow made his home feel less like a museum and more like a place that breathed.
It irritated him to admit it. He’d built a life free from attachment, yet he found himself glancing at his phone during meetings, wondering if she’d changed the flowers in the hallway again. Wondering if she still hummed when she worked.
And at night, in the sterile comfort of his hotel room, he thought of her eyes when she smiled, the faint tremor in her voice when she said Thank you.
He tried to tell himself it was just a case of loneliness. But loneliness had never felt this alive.
By the third night, he couldn’t stand it. He booked an early flight back. His staff would call it impulsive. He didn’t care.
He just needed to see her.
Eliza’s POV
The morning he returned, the house was quiet. She’d spent the last few days avoiding his study, pretending not to see the photograph that had shattered everything inside her.
But she couldn’t avoid him forever.
When the car pulled into the driveway, her pulse raced. She heard the low murmur of his voice through the open window, deep and familiar in a way that made her heart ache.
He entered the foyer, suitcase in hand. Their eyes met.
For a long moment, neither spoke.
“You’re back early,” she managed, her voice softer than she intended.
He nodded, watching her closely. “The meetings ended sooner than expected.”
A lie. She knew it. And so did he.
There was something different in his gaze — the composure she’d grown used to was gone, replaced by something raw, almost restless.
“I trust everything ran smoothly while I was away?”
“Yes, sir.”
He stepped closer. “You look tired.”
She swallowed. “Just long days.”
Eliza’s heart drummed so hard she was sure he could hear it. Alexander stood only a few feet away, his suitcase still by the door, his gaze locked on her like he’d forgotten the reason he came home.
Something charged filled the air, too quiet, too heavy. The kind of silence that trembles right before it breaks.
He studied her as if trying to memorize every small detail: the curl of her hair that had come loose, the faint nervous tremor of her hands, the rise and fall of her breath.
“Did you miss me, Eliza?”
The question startled her. He had never asked her anything so personal before.
Her voice came out barely above a whisper. “It’s not my place to.”
“But you did,” he said softly, stepping closer. “Didn’t you?”
She tried to look away, but his tone held her still. “You shouldn’t ask me that.”
“Then answer it anyway.”
Her throat tightened. “Yes,” she breathed, “I missed you.”
Alexander’s iron discipline, which controlled every part of his life, fractured in that moment. His eyes darkened, and his hand lifted almost hesitantly, brushing against her jaw. Her breath caught as his fingers slid behind her neck, the warmth of his touch making her knees weak.
“Eliza…”
Her name in his voice felt like a confession.
He tilted her chin up, his thumb tracing the edge of her lip. She should have pulled away, reminded herself of the distance between them, but her body betrayed her, leaning into the heat of him.
He took a small step forward, closing the gap. “Tell me to stop.”
She couldn’t. Every reason to run dissolved under the weight of his gaze.
When he finally kissed her, it was slow at first, testing and searching, but quickly deepened into something hungry and desperate. A low sound escaped him, the kind he hadn’t made in years, and it sent a shiver through her.
Her fingers clutched at his shirt, feeling the tension beneath it, the restraint, the need. He tasted like whiskey and exhaustion and something dangerously close to longing.
He pulled her closer, his arm sliding around her waist, pressing her against him. The kiss grew rougher, all the frustration and loneliness between them igniting into something that neither of them had words for.
She gasped when his lips left hers to find the curve of her throat. “Alexander…”
“Repeat it,” he murmured against her skin, his voice rough, breath unsteady.
Her hands trembled as she whispered, “Alexander.”
It broke him.
He kissed her again, deeper this time, the kind of kiss that made time blur. Everything about it was wrong. She worked for him, and he was supposed to know better, but at that moment, neither cared.
When he finally tore himself away, both were breathing hard, their foreheads pressed together.
“This shouldn’t have happened,” she said, her voice shaking.
“I know,” he whispered, brushing his thumb across her lower lip again. “But I don’t regret it.”
She looked up at him, eyes wide, uncertain. “You should.”
“Maybe,” he said quietly, “but I can’t.”
He stepped back slowly, as if afraid that if he stayed one more second, he’d lose every bit of control he had left.
“Eliza,” he murmured, his voice softer now, almost tender. “I came back because I couldn’t stop thinking about you. Every city, every meeting, every hour, I wanted to be here. With you.”
Her pulse quickened, but she couldn’t bring herself to answer. The words tangled in her throat, caught between fear and desire.
He reached for his suitcase, his jaw tight, his voice low again. “Rest. You look like you haven’t slept.”
She nodded faintly, watching him walk past her toward the stairs, every step echoing through the house.
When he disappeared from sight, she pressed her fingers to her lips, still trembling.
Her heart was racing not just from what had happened, but from what it meant.
Because that kiss had felt like the beginning of something she didn’t know how to stop.
And somewhere deep down, beneath the heat of it all, a voice whispered that the truth she’d been avoiding the photograph, the locket, the memory of a boy she once knew—was not finished with her yet.
