A few months earlier, Anna Thompson had already reached the absolute end of herself.
No matter how many times she tried to push Joseph Carpenter away, he refused to disappear. He kept returning like a ghost tethered to her life... relentless, unyielding, and painfully familiar.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Bouquets of expensive roses left on her doorstep. Late-night calls that stretched into the early hours of the morning. Long, dramatic apologies delivered while he stood outside her gate in the rain. Endless promises to change. Promises to become a better man. Promises wrapped in the kind of desperate sincerity that only came after everything had already been broken.
But Anna had learned the hardest lesson of all: some things could not be repaired simply because regret had finally arrived. Love, no matter how fierce, wasn't always enough to rebuild trust once it had been shattered one too many times. And Joseph had shattered hers repeatedly.
