Chapter Thirty-Four: Lonely Nights

Samantha sat in bed, wrapped in ivory silk pajamas, matching top and shorts, flawless in cut, soft as breath. She looked immaculate, as always.

She didn’t feel immaculate.

Her hand hovered over her phone.

Not touching. Not typing. Just hovering.

She didn’t press the screen. Didn’t open the message thread. Just stared at his name, Daniel, and let the silence stretch.

She was lonely.

Painfully, pathetically lonely.

It had been a long time since she’d been in a bed alone. Even before Daniel, there’d always been someone boyfriends, roommates, friends who stayed the night after too much wine. Sleepovers with girls when she was too young to understand what she was reaching for in their closeness. But even then, she had never felt this alone.

The house was spotless, curated, quiet. A museum of intention. Every detail considered. The color palette muted and tasteful. The art, real. The books, leather-bound.

Decorated like the old money wealth she belonged to.

The Sinclair name was old. Mayflower old.

They didn’t talk about money, they just had it. Inheritance. Legacy. Expectations.

She was a Sinclair before she was Samantha. She’d been raised to perform, at luncheons, at school, at Yale. And later, in her marriage.

Even with Daniel.

Especially with Daniel.

That made her guilty.

She loved Daniel, but she’d betrayed him.

Because she’d been lonely. Lonely while he’d been chasing money and power.

And she knew she couldn’t blame him. It was her fault he’d done that. Because he’d seen the way she grimaced at their apartment in Los Angeles. The way she flinched at the neighbors arguing through the walls. The way her smile thinned every time the heat flickered in winter, or the faucet ran rust-red for three seconds too long.

He’d seen the disappointment she didn’t voice and tried to fix it the only way he knew how—by working harder, climbing faster, becoming the kind of man who could give her the life she was born to expect.

And in doing so, he had disappeared.

Olivia had always been there. Always waiting. Always with the gentle hints.

And Samantha?

She’d wanted comfort.

Her hand slipped down between her thighs, and for a moment, she imagined.

Her husband, Daniel. His weight. His warmth. God, he was always warm. She imagined the scent of his skin, the faded cologne he wore out of habit, and the scratch of his chest against hers as he leaned in, murmuring something just for her.

Her fingers slipped beneath the silk of her shorts, finding heat. She let out a soft, involuntary moan, quiet and breathy in the pristine silence of the bedroom.

And then she imagined him as he used to be. Slow. Reverent. Almost too careful.

Too slow.

Too reverent.

Too… polite.

Her hips shifted, searching for something sharper.

And that’s when her mind betrayed her.

It drifted, to her.

To Olivia.

Dangerous, daring Olivia.

She remembered the bite of her teeth on her neck. The way she whispered crude, obscene promises in her ear like confessions. The way she took what she wanted, without apology. The way her fingers moved with practiced certainty, until Samantha forgot her own name.

That thought, that sting, was what broke her.

Everyone always left.

Samantha pulled her hand away, breath unsteady, the heat still pulsing between her legs, unanswered. Her chest rose and fell. Guilt pressed in like a second skin.

She rolled to her side, away from the sensation, the memory, the truth.

And reached for her phone.

She didn’t text Daniel. Or Olivia.

She texted Claire, a friend from high school. They’d cheered together, sat on bleachers and passed lip gloss and gossip like currency. A safe choice. A distant one.

Hey, can we meet up this week?

The reply came quickly.

I’d love to. But is everything all right?

Yeah, I just feel like we haven’t spent much time together recently.

She didn’t mention that she was lonely.

That she wanted someone to see her.

That she’d just tried to fuck herself to a ghost and a grudge and still come up empty.

She wasn’t that pathetic.

Not yet.