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CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
publish date:
2026-08-07 01:40:40
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The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Ryan's POVDorian wanted to meet somewhere dim and forgettable, which told me plenty before he'd said a word — a scotch bar three blocks from his office, the kind of place with no sign out front and a bartender who didn't ask questions about tabs closed in cash.He was already at a corner table when I got there, tie loosened, two fingers of something amber in front of him that he hadn't touched yet. Four years hadn't changed much about Dorian — same easy grin that never quite reached past his mouth, same watch worth more than most people's cars, same instinct for knowing exactly how much information to trade for exactly how much it cost him."Ryan." He didn't stand, just gestured at the empty chair across from him with the same practiced charm he'd used in Singapore right before that deal fell apart under both of us. "You look like a man who's been doing well for himself.""You called me, Dorian. Let's skip the part where we pretend you're happy to see me."He laughed, short, and fina
The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER FORTY
Adrian's POVGrant answered on the third ring, background noise behind him suggesting he was somewhere with traffic, a headset probably clipped to one ear while he drove toward whatever his next job was."Mr. Cole. Wasn't expecting to hear from you until Friday.""This isn't about Ava." I stood at my study window, the grounds gone dark outside, the fountain lit from below in a way that made the water look colder than it actually was. "I need you to redirect. New scope."A pause, brief, the sound of him adjusting something on his end — pulling over, maybe, or reaching for a notepad. "I'm listening.""The Whitmore party. The one that started everything. I want you to find out who else was in that hotel that night — staff, guests, anyone with access to the private function rooms between nine and eleven. Cross-reference the guest list if you can get it, and cross-reference all of it against a timeline I'll send you. Specifically, I want to know where Vivian Ashcroft was during that window
The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Vivian's POVI booked the corner table at Amara's myself this time, because leaving reservations to Adrian's other assistant had gotten me a table by the kitchen door twice in the last month, and I was done pretending that didn't feel like a message.He arrived twelve minutes late, which was unlike him, and slid into his seat with an apology that sounded like it belonged to someone else's mouth. I'd learned to read the weather in his face by now — four years of practice — and tonight's forecast was somewhere I hadn't charted before. Not the blank distraction from two weeks ago. Sharper. Deliberate."You look like you've been thinking hard about something," I said, pouring his wine before the waiter could, my hand steady, my smile easy. "Good thinking or bad thinking?""Old business." He turned his glass by the stem without drinking from it. "Something from the family archive I finally got around to reading properly."I kept my expression warm, curious, nothing more than a woman intere
The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Ava's POVFacilities needed sign-off on the east wing renovation before Friday, and Marcus had flagged Thomas Bellamy as the point person for logistics, which meant I found myself back in the same stairwell corridor I'd stood in two weeks ago, this time with a clipboard instead of a payroll box."Ms. Carter." He straightened from where he'd been marking measurements on the wall, tape measure retracting with a snap. "Wasn't expecting you for this. Figured Marcus would just email it over."‘I wanted to see the space myself before I signed off on the budget.’ Sophie caught up a step behind me, and I watched Thomas's shoulders settle into the easy, professional posture he probably used for every executive who walked this hallway, no trace left of the raw moment we'd shared here two weeks earlier.We walked the corridor together, him pointing out load-bearing concerns, me nodding along, asking the kind of practical questions that had nothing to do with anything except drywall and electrica
The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Ryan's POVI brought Thai again, mostly because it worked the first time and I'd never been the kind of man who fixed something that wasn't broken.Her office door was open when I got there, which was new — most nights lately I'd found it half-shut, a signal I'd learned to read without needing words attached to it. Tonight it sat wide open, and Nora was propped in her car seat on the guest chair, red-faced and fussing, one small fist working against the strap like she had somewhere better to be.Ava didn't look up from her laptop. "If you're here to tell me to go home, save it.""I'm here because I remembered you like extra lime." I set the bag down and crossed to the car seat instead of the desk, crouching until I was at Nora's eye level. She stopped fussing long enough to study me with the deep suspicion of a person meeting a stranger for the second time and not entirely trusting the first impression. "Rough day, huh."‘She's still not sleeping right. Fever broke yesterday but she's
The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Adrian's POVThe file had sat in the safe behind my desk for almost a years, untouched since the week the firm my mother hired delivered it and I signed off on the summary without reading past the first page.I remembered why. I had been twenty-six years old with a company being trapped into a marriage by a woman I was certain had orchestrated the entire thing herself, and the summary had told me everything I wanted to hear at the time — an incident at the Whitmore party, a drink, a lapse in judgment, consequences to be managed. I had not needed the details. I had needed the problem solved, and my mother's people had solved it the way our family solved most problems, quietly, with enough money that nobody outside the room ever asked a second question.I pulled the file now and set it on the desk, and my hands were steadier opening it than they had any right to be, given how much of the last three years I had built on the strength of never looking inside it properly.Security logs firs
The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER TWO
Ava’s POVI had no idea how long I had been unconscious.The last thing I remembered was the doctors barking instructions at each other across the room, Mrs. Chen frantically trying to reach Adrian on the phone while the call went straight to voicemail, and me trying too — several times, my fingers
The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER FIVE
{Ava's POV}I stared at the message I had just sent and listened to my heart pound.Mr. Harold Bennett had been my father's closest friend and business partner for nearly two decades — the kind of man who had been a fixture at our dinner table when my mother was still alive, who had always spoken to
The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER FOUR
{Ava's POV}I watched Adrian step out of the room to take his call and felt my shoulders sink under the weight of something I was too tired to name. The nerve of him — walking in here with that blank, impenetrable expression, as though I was the one who had done something wrong. As though I was the
The Muted Wife’s Return CHAPTER THREE
{Adrian's POV}Guilt was not an emotion I was particularly familiar with. I had spent most of my adult life making decisions with clarity and conviction, and I rarely looked back at them long enough to second-guess myself. But for the past several hours, it had been sitting in the center of my ches
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