7

7Alex’s POV.

The office was dark except for the glow of my desk lamp. My PA stood there, files pressed so tightly to his chest I half expected him to bruise. His eyes darted from the folder to me and back again, like he was weighing whether to hand me a loaded gun or an overdue utility bill.

“Sir, there’s been a development. You’ll want to see this immediately.”

I didn’t bother sitting. “What is it?”

He set the file down in front of me. “We were preparing to transfer the alimony, as instructed. Routine, or so I thought. But Stella’s account bounced the payment. I tried the backup numbers and accounts, but… sir, she’s wiped everything. There’s no working contact, no active account. It’s like she’s…gone.”

He waited for a reaction. I gave him none. My heart was beating hard in my chest but I held his gaze, expression flat. “So find her brother. Josh Harrington. He worked for us. There must be a record.”

“We checked. He resigned the same week Stella left. No forwarding address. No job applications. We even tried his last listed number but it’s disconnected. His apartment’s been rented out. Sir, I don’t think they want to be found.”

I leaned on the edge of my desk, jaw tight, willing myself to stay calm. Disappearances don’t just happen. Not with people as methodical as Stella. Not unless someone is running. Or hiding.

“Pull up Josh’s HR file,” I said. “Get his supervisor on the phone. I want to know who did his exit paperwork.”

My PA nodded, almost relieved to have an order he could act on. I watched him leave, the door clicking behind him, and for a long moment, I stood there staring at the dark windows, thinking about the last time I’d seen Stella. Her face, perfectly composed, her goodbye so quiet it felt almost merciful. I’d been angry at the time, too angry to ask why she was so calm. Now, all I felt was a slow, creeping sense of dread.

I didn’t want to admit it, but I’d miscalculated. I thought Stella would move out, take her settlement, maybe start over in some apartment in the city. I thought I’d hear about her through the grapevine, maybe see her one day on the arm of some other man and feel a twist of jealousy I could bottle up and call “closure.”

But Stella hadn’t just left. She’d vanished. And she’d taken Josh with her.

I didn’t sleep that night. I spent the early hours scrolling through HR systems, scanning every record I could find, rereading every email exchange with Stella, searching for some hidden clue. By the time the sun edged over the city skyline, my eyes ached, and my brain was thrumming with theories and accusations.

First thing, I drove to the hospital. I cut through the morning traffic like a man with an emergency, barely aware of the horns or the sharp glances as I parked illegally by the front doors.

Inside, the staff recognized me immediately. Most averted their eyes, but a few looked at me with that peculiar blend of fear and curiosity reserved for bosses who show up unannounced.

Josh’s supervisor pulled up his employment file without comment.

I scanned through it, barely noticing the formalities. Josh’s formal resignation, the date: the exact day Stella signed the divorce papers. A hasty digital signature, a blank forwarding address. Nothing. The file was clean, almost too clean.

But then I noticed something else. His patient list. Routine enough, until my eyes snagged on a name I hadn’t expected to see: Stella Harrington. I clicked through the medical notes, my heart in my throat.

Josh had managed her case personally. It was all there in sterile language; lab results, checkup notes, recommendations. But one entry, bolded in the system, froze my blood.

“Patient is pregnant. Advised bed rest due to risk of miscarriage.”

I read it twice. Three times. It still didn’t make sense.

Pregnant. Stella had been pregnant. All this time, when I thought she was lying, when I’d been cold, when I’d pushed her out, when I’d watched her sign those papers with hands that didn’t shake, she was carrying my child.

A flicker of memory: the night she wouldn’t take the wine the maid offered, the fatigue in her eyes, the way she’d pressed her hand to her stomach when she thought I wasn’t looking. The way she’d stopped Josh from telling me something in the hospital corridor. All the moments I’d dismissed, rationalized away as Stella being dramatic, or stubborn, or simply difficult.

I felt sick.

The supervisor watched me, silent and wary. I tried to speak but found I had no words.

Finally, I managed, “Did anyone else know? About her pregnancy?”

She shook her head. “No. Just Josh, as far as I’m aware. Stella made it clear she wanted privacy. She left with her brother and said she’d be in touch if there were complications.”

I felt a fire rise inside me; anger, shame, and something like desperation. “So you’re telling me no one in this hospital knows where she is now?”

A pause. “No, sir.”

I strode out of the office, rage and confusion swirling. Back at the hospital admin wing, I called an emergency meeting of every manager, every senior nurse, every department head. The room filled quickly, nervous faces looking back at me.

“My ex-wife was under your care,” I said, voice ringing out cold and hard. “She was pregnant when she left. Her brother resigned the same week, with no forwarding information. If anyone in this room knows where Stella Harrington is, or where Josh Harrington went, now is the time to speak up.”

Silence.

No one met my eyes. I saw only fear, confusion, or the careful blankness of people who don’t want to get involved.

I slammed my hand on the table. “This isn’t a joke. I want answers.”

Nothing. Just the hum of the air conditioner and the tap-tap-tap of someone’s nervous fingers against a folder.

I realized then how thoroughly she’d vanished. Stella was always braver than I gave her credit for. If she didn’t want to be found, she wouldn’t be.

The meeting ended with mumbled apologies and hollow promises to “let me know if anything turned up.” I left the hospital feeling emptier than ever, my mind whirring with a thousand possibilities: Was she safe? Was she angry? Did she hate me? Was she carrying my child somewhere in the world, keeping that secret because she couldn’t trust me with the truth?

For the first time since the divorce, I stopped blaming her. For the first time, I blamed myself. For not listening. For not seeing. For letting my anger blind me to what was right in front of me.

I got into my car and sat there, hands on the steering wheel, staring at my own reflection in the glass. I’d always thought I could control everything. That the truth would come out when I demanded it.

But some truths, it turned out, could only be learned too late.