Semua Bab My Father's Rival Is My Lover : Bab 41 - Bab 50

The sun had just begun its climb over the horizon when Liana woke to the sound of birdsong and the soft weight of Ethan’s arm draped across her waist.She didn’t move right away.Instead, she lay there for a moment, her fingers resting gently on her belly. There was no bump yet. No obvious change. But something inside her was already beginning.She turned slowly to face Ethan.“I want to tell you something,” she whispered.His eyes blinked open. Sleepy, soft. “Yeah?”“I took the test again.”He sat up, instantly alert. “And?”She smiled. “It’s positive.”For a moment, he said nothing. Just stared at her like she had handed him the entire galaxy.Then, without warning, he laughed, that full, open laugh that only Cassie could ever make him do before.“You’re sure?” he asked, voice catching.She nodded, tears starting to slip down her cheeks. “We’re going to be parents.”Later that day, they told Cassie and Damon first.It was a quiet afternoon at the estate, sunlight slanting through th

It began with a sketch.Grace sat beneath the oak tree with her journal open across her lap, the tip of her pencil dragging gently across the page. Around her, the garden buzzed with summer, bees floating lazily, wind humming through branches, the distant giggle of her sisters from the porch swing.She had titled the new journal:“The Fire We Haven’t Lit Yet.”Cassie had smiled when she heard the name, but Grace could tell there was something deeper behind the way her grandma’s eyes softened.That evening, Grace asked her.“Grandma, what fire haven’t you lit yet?”Cassie looked up from the teacup in her hand. “What do you mean?”“You always said every fire had a purpose. A reason. One that waited to be found. So what’s yours, the one you still haven’t told?”Cassie was quiet for a long time.Then she stood. “Come with me.”They climbed the stairs to the attic. Grace had only been there a few times, it was the Turner family’s archive now, full of journals, letters, scrapbooks, even chi

Twenty years later, the Turner Estate still stood, strong, sun-washed, and alive with stories.The garden had grown wilder, more colorful. New trees shaded the paths where once only seedlings had been. The oak tree, the great sentinel, stretched taller than ever, its roots gripping the earth like a sacred promise.And tonight, under its ancient branches, the Turner family would gather once more.But this time, it wasn’t Cassie or Damon leading them.It was Nova.Nova stood barefoot on the soft grass, her deep brown curls twisted into a crown braid, a notebook tucked against her chest.At twenty, she carried the kind of steady light that only comes from generations of flame keepers before her.She was a Turner in every way, thoughtful, bold, fiercely tender.Her twin cousins, Zuri and Ella, now nineteen, stood beside her. Grace, now a published author and advocate at thirty, leaned against the oak tree, watching proudly.Hope and Ayden sat nearby, hands clasped.Ethan and Liana, older

The letter arrived on a golden morning, tucked inside a worn envelope, the handwriting unmistakable.Cassie’s.It had been six months since she passed, peacefully, gently, in the garden she had planted with her own hands. Damon had followed quietly two weeks later, as if his heart had simply followed hers.Now, Nova sat on the porch of the Turner Estate, the letter trembling in her fingers.She wasn’t alone.Beside her sat Grace, Zuri, Ella, and dozens of others, the next generation of dreamers, builders, fire-bearers.Hope had called it The Gathering.One final celebration of Cassie and Damon’s life, but more than that, a passing of a sacred rhythm.A rhythm called legacy.Nova opened the letter slowly.She read aloud.To my firewalkers,If you're reading this, it means I’ve left this body.But not this world.Not this family.Not this fire.I wrote many stories in my life.Some public.Some private.But none more meaningful than the one I wrote with all of you.You were my favorite

The Spark Beneath Her SilenceThe Cassie & Damon Legacy Sanctuary was quiet in the early morning, not empty, but intentional. The halls pulsed with unspoken purpose, like a heart beating softly in prayer.Nova stood on the third floor of the archive library, her hand tracing the spine of a dusty book titled How Empires Remember. It was old, handwritten in places, and full of insights she’d read a dozen times, but today, it felt different.Something was shifting.In the air.In her chest.In the flame she carried.Her fingers trembled slightly as she closed the book and turned around.“Nova,” a voice said, crisp and smooth. “I thought I’d find you here.”She froze.Because she knew that voice.Because it belonged to him.The one person she hadn’t spoken to in three years.Liam Caldwell.Billionaire tech strategist.Co-founder of the global fintech empire known as Veritas.Cassie’s godson.And the man who had broken Nova’s heart without ever touching it.Three years earlier, he had been