The café hummed with muted chatter, the clinking of cups, the hiss of steaming milk. Ethan sat alone in a booth by the window, stirring coffee he barely tasted. The food in front of him was growing cold, untouched but for a few half-hearted bites.
He couldn’t tell John about this. Couldn’t even look Julia in the eye, though her last message still blinked in his phone like a quiet accusation. He had told her he needed a week—time for the girls, time to breathe. A lie that felt almost noble compared to the filth crawling through his thoughts.
What had begun as an intriguing clinical case was now a labyrinth of fear and desire, and he was the rat scurrying deeper with every turn.
He was halfway through that bitter thought when the bench dipped beside him. A familiar scent—faint citrus over
