Those words stayed with him.
Then his friends repeated them.
Nobody stays broke voluntarily.
She’s playing the long game.
She refuses small gifts so you won’t notice when she goes after the big prize.
Slowly, Archie began looking at Skyla differently.
When she spent an entire Sunday cleaning his apartment and cooking meals he could reheat during a busy week, he wondered:
Is she trying to prove how useful she’d be as a wife?
When she embroidered his mother’s initials onto a linen handkerchief for her birthday, he thought:
She’s trying to win Eleanor over.
The woman he once admired for being sincere suddenly looked strategic.
Nothing about Skyla had changed.
Only Archie’s interpretation of her.
The breaking point came in November.
Skyla arrived at his penthouse soaked from another storm.
Her laptop was tucked beneath her arm.
The hinge had snapped.
The plastic casing had split open.
