Private Confession

He met her on Christmas at the cabin as she requested, and when she told him that she was pregnant and he was only a donor, he recognized it immediately as a test. Stepping right into her trap, he met her gaze and didn't flinch.

"I won't pretend I don't want more," he told her, his voice tight. "I'll take responsibility for the child, and I won't walk away from what we made. But I can't leave my marriage tonight. I'm not ready to burn everything down. I know you are."

Laly's eyes turned to ice. "You walk out of this cabin, then it is over."

He walked out of that cabin into a slow-motion freefall. Months bled into a grinding routine where he was no longer a lawyer, but a glorified paralegal chained to a desk for endless hours. At home, the illusion of his marriage crumbled further; Madison offered hollow excuses about late nights meeting friends, yet he always returned to the unmistakable, suffocating scent of Gertrude's perfume lingering on her.

One early morning, he heard raised voices echoing from one of the conference rooms. At first glance, he thought it was Laly—she looked identical down to the exact face. But something was fundamentally off. Her usual mole was missing, she carried herself with a sharper, more predatory posture, and her entire demeanor radiated an aggressive, cutting authority he hadn't seen before.

The argument was fierce, with her trading razor-sharp legal jabs directly with Gertrude, their mutual animosity thick enough to cut with a knife. Two other partners rushed into the room to intervene, led by Rumi, the formidable head of international law. Once Rumi successfully defused the tense standoff, she gestured sharply for him to step inside. The woman he mistook for Laly brushed past him in the doorway, completely freezing him out as if they had never met.

Rumi turned to him, her expression unreadable. "Mr. Doe, I want you and Yuri to do the hearing. The first meeting is hearing their demands and nothing else. And I want to see both of you complete the process to the end."

"Gertrude, he isn't some pawn for you to bury," Rumi interjected, her voice cutting through the office with cold authority. "Maybe you should keep your temper in check instead of trying to systematically sink every associate who doesn't kiss your ring. We need a lawyer, and he will do. My niece is an excellent liquidator and will hide any weaknesses. I have no idea why you're suffocating his career and keeping him chained to glorified paralegal work, unless you have something else to hide from the other partners."

Gertrude tightened her jaw, her eyes flashing with pure venom. "Fine, you can have him until this is resolved."

She stormed off down the corridor. As she turned the corner, Rumi muttered under her breath, "Bitch."

Rumi is a striking Asian American woman in her early thirties, fixing me with an intense gaze from deep black eyes. Her long, shapely legs are accentuated by a tailored dress that leaves very little to the imagination, projecting the predatory confidence that earned her a notorious reputation as a workplace sexual harasser.

"Is it John?" she purrs, a slow, knowing smile touching her lips as she looks him up and down. "I suppose we should find a private office for the two of you. You'll love the kind of attention you're about to get around here."

Yuri, who looks like a younger, slightly taller version of her aunt with the same sharp features, steps forward with an amused smirk. "Boss, the office right next to mine is free. I just hope he isn't afraid of wandering hands—or wandering eyes."

Yuri turns to him, her eyes glinting with mischief. "We should leave now."

He’s completely unaccustomed to being spoken to with such blatant, unapologetic forwardness, his cheeks burning as Rumi’s heavy, predatory stare lingers on his back the entire way out of the room.

He tries to make small talk as they walk, but the awkward tension is cut short when they arrive at the opposing firm for the initial filing prep. He again attempts to break the silence as Yuri drags him down the corridor, but the words completely die in his throat when they step into the opposing firm's conference area.

There, standing side by side in the hallway, are the identical twins. Laly is storming toward the elevators, shooting him a venomous, ice-cold glare that stops him dead in his tracks. Right beside her, leaning against the doorframe with an amused, knowing smirk, is the other sister.

He stands frozen, staring back and forth between the two identical faces, utterly stunned into silence. The woman who stayed behind steps forward, tilting her head with a perverse glint in her eye as she extends a hand. "My professional name is Farrah Renoir.".