Lahat ng Kabanata ng The Unwanted Wife and Her Secret Twins: Kabanata 501 - Kabanata 510

Mia's POVWe took the elevator back up. Madison pressed the button. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.The doors opened.The hallway was quiet. It was always quiet on this floor. The ICU had a particular quality of silence—not empty, but muffled. Held. Like the building itself was holding its breath.I pushed the door open.Alexander was still standing by the bed. Still talking. His voice had gone hoarse now, scratchy at the edges, but he hadn't stopped."—and then the dragon said, 'I'm not scary, I'm just misunderstood,' and the princess said, 'Well, you should work on your communication skills,' and the dragon said—"He stopped when he saw us."Madison, you're back. I'm telling Daddy about the dragon and the princess. Do you want to help? You can be the princess voice. I'm doing the dragon voice."Madison walked to the sofa. Sat down. Pulled Eleanor against her chest."Maybe later," she said."Okay." Alexander turned back to Kyle. "Madison says maybe later. She's shy. But she'll do the princess voice e

Mia's POVThe apartment smelled something familiar. The lavender of the diffuser I'd left running in the living room. The faint, stubborn sweetness of the cookies Alexander had baked last week, burned on the edges, still somehow lingering in the kitchen walls. The woolly, animal warmth that meant Gas.I stood in the doorway and let the smell of it wash over me.Alexander pushed past me first. "We're HOME!" he announced. "WE'RE HOME AND DADDY'S ALIVE!"His voice bounced off the walls. Off the family photos in the hallway—the one from last Christmas where Ethan was mid-sneeze, the one from Madison's adoption day where we were all crying and smiling at once. Off the coatrack with its tangle of scarves and jackets, the top hook still holding the raincoat I'd been meaning to donate for six months.The lights came on. One by one. The living room with the blanket still bunched on the couch where Madison had been sitting when I told them we were goin

Mia's POVGas looked up at us. Her eyes were bright, wild with something ancient and instinctive. She whined."Mama." Alexander's hand found mine. "Is Gas okay?""She's fine. This is normal." I squeezed his fingers. "But it might take a long time. Hours, maybe. Dogs don't have their babies all at once.""How long?""I don't know exactly. Every dog is different.""Can we stay? Can we watch?"I looked at them. Three small faces, still damp from the bath, still flushed from the warm water. Three sets of eyes, wide and worried and hopeful."Not tonight," I said."But—""It's almost two in the morning. You need to sleep.""We're not tired!""Alexander, you were literally falling asleep in the car.""That was CAR tired. This is PUPPY tired. Different kinds of tired.""There's only one kind of tired, and you have it.""That's not scientifically accurate," Ethan said."Bed. Now."Alexander opened his

Mia's POVSmall feet on hardwood.The shuffle of sleep-heavy steps. The creak of the third floorboard from the hallway—the one Alexander always jumps over during the day but forgets about at night."Mama?" Alexander's voice. "Mama, what's—"He stops.Three small figures in the dim light. Alexander in front, his dinosaur pajamas twisted, one sock missing, hair flat on the left side where he was sleeping. Ethan just behind him, squinting, one hand on the wall like he's not quite sure he's awake. Madison at the back.Alexander's eyes find Kyle first.I watch it happen, the moment of wait, Daddy's supposed to be in the hospital, and then something else. Then his gaze moves past Kyle. To the puppy in Kyle's hands."Is that..." He's already walking. His bare feet slap against the floor, too loud in the quiet. "Is that one of the babies? Why isn't it—why is it so still?""Alexander—""It's not moving." He's beside Kyle now, dropping to his knees, his face level with Kyle's hands. "Daddy, it'

Mia's POVThe kind of morning that doesn't care about sleepless nights or kitchen floors covered in towels or the way your knees have gone numb from kneeling.The sun just comes up anyway.Gas is still lying in the whelping box. Her breathing has slowed. Six puppies are clustered against her belly. Six small bodies, each one no bigger than my palm, their eyes sealed shut, their ears folded flat against their heads. They move in that particular way newborn things move—not quite coordinated, not quite intentional, just small twitches and squirms as they search for warmth, for milk, for the heartbeat that has been their whole world until twenty minutes ago.The first one—the one that almost wasn't—is in the middle.I can see it from here. Smaller than the others. Its fur still damp, not quite dried despite all the towels, all the rubbing. But its chest is rising. Falling. Rising again."Mama."Alexander's voice is a rasp. Sandpaper wrapped in cotton. He's been talking for hours—to Kyle,