The Garden of Love

The night in Tokyo was still young, but Ethan’s penthouse looked as if it had swallowed a decade of rage.

Half drunk whiskey sat abandoned on the marble counter, a slow drip sliding down the bottle’s neck. The air was heavy with cigar smoke, silence, and the faint pulse of the city far below.

Ethan sat in the dark, his suit jacket tossed aside, his white shirt unbuttoned halfway down his chest. The skyline leaked through the curtains in pale gold streaks, crossing his ...