Ember heard something from down the hall. She bolted up in bed forgetting temporarily where she was. But then it came back to her. She was in Zander’s bed in his house. Everything was ok. He was probably just getting something to eat or drink. She laid back down and closed her eyes.

But then she heard the car leaving down the driveway. Quickly she bolted out of bed and looked out the window. She could see his Ferrari speeding away from the home in the predawn hours. The darkness outside was just barely starting to fade.

Where was he going in such a hurry? And at this hour? Why would he leave without saying something to her? It didn’t make sense.

That’s when she noticed a flashing light on his house phone’s answering machine. She didn’t know he even had a landline. It must have been a rich thing to have both nowadays, but then again, they were kind of far from town. She was not sure how good the cell reception really was around here.

For some reason, she could not explain she found herself walking over to answer that message. The seeds of doubt that had already been planted in her from the rocky hurdles that she and Zander had already experienced, the past mistakes she’d made with me—it all came together right then to force her to take a look at that phone.

She checked the call history and the last call on the phone was from Club Privaat from earlier in the evening. It was before they had even gone out for the evening.

Ember was stunned; she couldn’t believe that this was happening. He was still communicating with these people. He must have kept his account active there or maybe he really was staying in business with that guy he pretended to hate.

She calmed herself down and tried not to get angry. But her mind was going crazy again. She kept hearing Liza’s voice of reason in her head telling her not to jump to conclusions. She knew that she loved this man and she wanted to give him every possible benefit of the doubt that she could here, but it was not working. The more she stood there thinking about it, the angrier she got. Why was this happening? It seemed that everything was conspiring to tear them apart. The minute that she started to feel comfortable and happy with the way things were going this came back up again.

She felt stupid. She had forgiven him twice and admitted that she was wrong on both accounts. Now here it was plain as day; he was still going to be involved with Club Pivaat and he was going to do who knew what with how many random women?

Ember grabbed her things, called an uber, and quietly left Zander’s mansion. On the ride home she did not talk, ignoring the driver who kept trying to make small talk which included lame attempts at flirting. She was not in the mood at all.

She couldn’t stop thinking about it all. Why was she so gullible? Was it her problem? Should she even be mad at him?

Yes. She absolutely should be mad at him. He’d made her a promise and now he was clearly breaking the promise. Of course, she hadn’t even asked him to stop the business deal he had with Club Privaat. She was not even worried about him being around all of those women or going back to the club and bidding on women in the auctions; she trusted him when he said he wanted to be with her.

But when he obviously tried to hide things from her then she had no choice but to become suspicious. When Zander told her he was not going to invest in Club Privaat she was amazed at how relieved and happy she was. Until that point she had not consciously thought that she was threatened or at all threatened of it. But when she was totally relieved that Zander would no longer be around that temptation she knew that she was scared and she was a bit paranoid.

That’s all she’d dismissed it as, was paranoia.

But then when her paranoia started to come true she knew that she was right for feeling that way. Her gut instincts had always been right. Looking back on her previous relationship with men who had treated her this way she knew there was something wrong then and she tried to tell herself that she was being paranoid and overreacting. But then it happened and it made it all the more devastating that she did not listen to herself.

She did not want to make that mistake again.

When she got home she told Liza what happened. This time her friend did not try to talk her out of it.

Ember had made the decision; she and Zander were done.