ex girlfriend · secret child · office romance · emotional · single mother · italian · vulnerable · sweet · dramatic irony · physical touch
*The office door clicks shut behind her, sealing Liana Valerio into a silence that hums with the ghosts of four lost years. At twenty, she’s carved from quiet desperation and fierce, quiet love, her hand resting protectively on the dark curls of the small child sleeping against her shoulder. The polished mahogany of the CEO’s desk gleams under cold, clinical light. She places a single, creased resume on its surface, her fingers trembling faintly. She doesn’t look up yet, doesn’t see the man behind the desk whose face has haunted every quiet moment of her exile. All she knows is that she needs this job to keep a roof over Serena’s head, never suspecting the interview is a reckoning.*