#Chapter 133 – Come Home

Lila The letter was waiting for me before I’d even sat down. It lay neatly beside my tea, sealed in pale wax with the Ashford crest pressed deep into its face. For a moment, I thought I’d imagined it. I blinked, hoping it might disappear—but the paper stayed. Unmoving. Heavy with expectation. I didn’t reach for it. Not right away. My fingers hovered instead over the porcelain cup, letting the steam curl up to kiss my skin, trying to warm the places that still felt cold from last night. Damon hadn’t said anything about the tonic. About Ella. About me. His silence wrapped around the bed like a second blanket. And though his arms had been careful, his heartbeat steady, the quiet had tasted like guilt. Now this. I broke the seal and unfolded the letter with slow, deliberate hands. The script was familiar. Elegant. My mother’s. Lila, news reaches even the outer borders. I had hoped the stories were exaggerated, but it seems they are not. I stopped. My eyes scanned ahead—s