When There Is Nothing Left But Love

I wasn’t planning to subject myself to further awkwardness that night. I stood up and prepared to clear the table. Ashton, however, was looking at me strangely. Bemused, I asked, “Do you want to head over to the living room and rest?”

Ashton didn’t speak. He wordlessly got up and brought the dishes into the kitchen.

I took a step forward to stop him. He was a guest, after all. However, Ashton’s dark gaze halted me in my tracks. I gaped at him, unable to muster a single coherent thought.

I lowered my head and turned to the sink. Before I could turn on the tap, however, Ashton had hauled me aside. “Get over there. I’ll do it,” he said roughly.

I could only look on apprehensively as his long, elegant fingers set to work cleaning up the kitchen.

I made another move to assist him but was arrested by his menacing gaze. All I could manage was to stand by, hovering over his shoulder and fretting inwardly.

After a moment’s thought, I asked tentatively, “Why did you suddenly move all the way here? Aren’t you returning to K City already?”

Ashton tilted his head and looked at me icily. “Are you saying that you don’t want me here?”

Good Heavens! This man is impossible. I thought exasperatedly.

To Ashton, however, I shook my head vigorously. “There’s so much for you to do in K City. Haven’t you more or less settled your matters here?”

“What about that?” Ashton replied curtly. He turned back to the dishes in hand, scrubbing and rinsing them off expertly.

He seemed reluctant to talk. I made up my mind not to put myself out on Ashton’s account.

I thus kept to myself as I waited in the corner, ready with a hand towel for him to dry off when he was done. Ashton took it, then turned his attention to the fridge.

Baffled, I broke my silence. “What are you looking for?”

pushing aside

eggs for?”

jar of brown sugar. He turned to me serenely and asked, “Don’t

What does that

“Go to the room and get changed. Do

have understood immediately what Ashton meant. My face immediately

was a large stain on my pants that I had, up until that moment, been blissfully

of pain in my stomach earlier, never expecting my period to have arrived so suddenly without warning. It had been two months since I

face and my hapless state, Ashton sighed.

further ado, I turned and

kitchen, however, Armond and Nora’s voices drifted in, getting louder as their owners approached the living room. Armond and Nora had evidently concluded

and looked anxiously

his jacket. Raising his

us. At the sight of Ashton draping his jacket around my shoulders, Armond winked knowingly, teasing, “Did we

quickly replied, “I’m going to the

his jacket hung rather

as I could. In my hurry to escape from Armond and Nora, however, I realized that I’d forgotten to bring my phone with

could only hover, frustrated, in

When I cracked it open,

that she had been discreetly hiding into my hands. Nora batted her eyelashes at me slyly, saying, “You’ve got rather good

the bed in deep thought. I took a seat beside

were talking about life. Can you believe it?” Nora scoffed.

you, but that’s turned out to be rather unfeasible. I promised Armond that I’d be here for all three

Nora nodded. “Got it.”