The morning sun broke over the Atlantic horizon not in a harsh glare, but in a soft, ethereal wash of gold and lavender. Two hundred miles away from the claustrophobic shadows of the city and the haunting terror of the campus locker room, Alexander’s private coastal estate clung to the edge of a jagged, towering cliffside. It was a architectural masterpiece of glass and reinforced steel—a secluded, multi-tiered villa that seemed to hover precariously over the churning, sapphire-blue waves of the ocean below.
Elena stood by the floor-to-ceiling glass wall of the grand living pavilion, holding a steaming mug of black coffee between her palms. She wore one of Alexander’s oversized white linen shirts over a pair of soft leggings, the hem falling halfway down her thighs. The scent of him—cedar
