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25 Claiming What Was Mine

작가: Karima Sa'ad Usman
last update 최신 업데이트: 2025-09-20 01:44:56

Arden’s POV

The phone rang before dawn, dragging me from the silence of the villa. The King’s voice was curt, clipped, and utterly predictable.

Report to the palace immediately.

I didn’t need to ask why. Of course, it was about Cassandra. About my “defiance.” About breaking her out of the palace without so much as a bow or permission.

I didn’t care.

For her, I would burn the palace to ash.

I stood at the balcony as the first blush of morning painted the horizon. The air was cool, heavy with the smell of dew and smoke from the city beyond.

My chest ached with everything I had kept buried for years, wanting Cassandra but convincing myself she wanted something else.

Five years ago, I could have reached for her. I could have ignored Ivana’s machinations, ignored the Montclairs’ ambition, ignored the throne that never tempted me. But she hadn’t fought. She hadn’t resisted. And when she didn’t, I told myself she wanted Richard. That she wanted to be Queen.

So I stayed away. Out of respect.
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Petagay Thompson
I like Arden. protect yours yes.
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Marlenny Fernandez
He’s a man unlike Richard’s mommy’s boy
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  • Tempting the Wrong Prince   102 What It Costs to Face Myself 2

    Richard’s POV“So tell me,” I continued, stepping closer, close enough that the harsh fluorescent lights carved brutal honesty across both our faces, “since when did spending time with a nanny become an obligation, Mum?”Her lips parted, ready to defend herself, ready to twist the entire situation into something convenient, but I didn’t allow her the room. Not anymore.“You created this mess,” I said quietly. Too quietly. The kind of quiet that shook even me. “And I will stick to the terms we agreed on. Once the children are healthy, Rachel returns to Erinville. Permanently. My life is already in ruins because of all the ways I let you meddle.”Rachel’s crying intensified at those words, her sobs ricocheting through the sterile hospital corridor like shards of broken glass, slicing through the tension, the guilt, the regret. But as her face crumpled and her shoulders shook, something terrifying dawned on me.I felt nothing.Or maybe not nothing, just a hollowed-out numbness so deep it

  • Tempting the Wrong Prince   101 What It Costs to Face Myself

    Richard’s POVRachel threw herself into my arms the second she saw me, sobbing, shaking, clinging like a woman drowning. Her body trembled violently against mine, fingers clutching at my coat as if she feared I might vanish if she let go.For a brief, disorienting moment, I didn’t know what to do with my hands.My mind rejected the embrace. My chest constricted.Not out of cruelty. Not out of blame.But because her touch, her presence, felt like a physical reminder of every wrong turn I had taken. Every compromise. Every lie I allowed to grow legs and walk through my marriage until it destroyed everything in its path.James was the one who needed me. Not her. Not this suffocating display of emotion.But Rachel cried harder, fists bunching the fabric at my shoulders, until my mother swept in, dramatic as ever, and wrapped a comforting arm around her.Typical.Ivanna’s voice trembled with anxiety, but the performance was still polished. “Rachel, how did this happen? Wasn’t James fin

  • Tempting the Wrong Prince   100 The Weight of What I Destroyed 2

    Richard’s POV“If she goes to him,” I said, each word low and deliberate, “it will be because you pushed her there. Not because she chose him over me, but because she could breathe around him. Because he shielded her from the storms you created. Because he made her feel seen. Valued. Safe.”My throat tightened.“Things I should have done,” I whispered. “Things you made impossible. Things I let you destroy.”“You are hurting me,” she breathed, hand trembling near her throat like a wounded actress.“I don’t care.”And I meant it.For the first time in my life, I truly didn’t care.“I am ashamed,” I said softly, the confession scraping through my chest. “Ashamed to call you my mother. And do not ever speak Cassandra’s name again. Do not meddle in her life. Do not speak of her in court. Do not approach her. If you do… you will lose me forever.”Her breath hitched sharply, the sound slicing the air between us.But before she could speak, before she could twist herself into another performa

  • Tempting the Wrong Prince   99 The Weight of What I Destroyed

    Richard’s POVThe moment Sandra’s words registered, that James was in the hospital, that he had aplastic anaemia, that he needed me, something inside me violently tore loose.I didn’t feel my feet move. I didn’t feel the air. I didn’t feel the ground beneath me.I only moved.People parted for me like a tide breaking around a single rock. I heard nothing, none of the murmurs erupting in the hallway, none of the reporters barking questions, not even my mother calling after me in that shrill, commanding tone she thought the world owed obedience to.Nothing reached me.I sprinted through the corridor, taking the stairs two, three at a time. Out of the courthouse. Into the blinding, merciless daylight.The driver had already been alerted somehow, perhaps through the palace network, perhaps from the chaos building behind me. The car screeched up to the front steps, and before the tyres fully stilled, my mother slipped in beside me, still adjusting her shawl, still trembling in that drama

  • Tempting the Wrong Prince   98 The Woman They Tried to Break 2

    Cassandra’s POVMy throat tightened. My vision pulsed at the edges. For a moment, just one devastating moment, I felt fourteen again. Standing in a political banquet hall filled with my father’s enemies. Every face turned toward me with contempt. Every voice whispering blame. Every accusation directed at my existence rather than my actions.But this time… I was not a girl.And I refused, absolutely refused, to fold.I lifted my chin, letting the weight of the cameras, the murmuring crowd, the sneering queen settle like dust around me.“You can spew whatever lies you like, Your Majesty,” I said, voice steady as carved stone, “but we both know the truth.”The courtyard stilled. Flashbulbs paused mid-burst. Even the guards stiffened.Ivanna froze mid-sob, hand still dramatically pressed to her chest.“You want to entertain the world?” I continued. “Fine. But let us not forget that you destroyed your son’s marriage long before anyone else came into the picture.”A crack split

  • Tempting the Wrong Prince   97 The Woman They Tried to Break

    Cassandra’s POVThe second I stepped out of the palace gates, urgency pushed me harder than fear ever could. The guards shouted after me, my name, my title, commands, but their voices were nothing more than distant echoes bouncing off stone. I did not look back. I couldn’t. There was no time to waste on rules meant to cage me.The driver must have sensed the danger radiating from me, because the moment I shouted for him to bring the car around, he reacted instantly. The vehicle rolled forward in a rush, the tyres barely meeting the gravel before he accelerated toward me.I yanked the door open and flung myself into the back seat. “Take me to the courthouse,” I said, breathless.“Yes, Your Highness.”He didn’t hesitate. The car lunged forward, swallowing the road in powerful strides. The city blurred past the windows, the wind howling against the frame as though urging us on. Good. Let it howl. Every second mattered. James’s life hung in the balance. A DNA test. An HLA match. A father

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