Lahat ng Kabanata ng Twice His Wife: Kabanata 11 - Kabanata 20

Anais stood in front of her mirror longer than usual the next morning. She wasn’t studying her reflection the way she used to—searching for flaws or trying to make herself softer, prettier, more tolerable. No, today she was looking for something else. Proof that she was still here. That the woman staring back at her wasn’t the girl who used to flinch at silence or explain herself to cold eyes and clipped words. Her robe hung open at the front as she stood in just her underthings—lace and bone-white satin, elegant but quiet. The air in the room was cool, goosebumps rising across her skin, but she didn’t reach for the robe yet. She noticed the way her collarbone looked sharper, her eyes darker. Not from makeup—she hadn’t touched her face yet. It was just something that had shifted. Subtle. Internal. But it showed. Her hair was loosely pinned up, with soft strands slipping around her face, and she let them fall. There was something about letting it all down now that felt intention

Cassian watched Anais from the doorway. She was standing in front of the window in the study again, exactly where she’d stood the night Julien and Dahlia were thrown out. But today, her stance was different. Not just still—grounded. Like she had finally stepped fully into her skin. She wasn’t afraid of him anymore. And that realization sat heavier than any boardroom betrayal ever had. He leaned against the doorframe, silent. She didn’t turn to acknowledge him. She knew he was there. Finally, he spoke. “You haven’t asked me what’s going to happen next.” Anais lifted her chin, eyes still on the street below. “Because I’m not waiting on your answer anymore.” There was no bitterness in her voice. Just calm certainty. Cassian stepped in slowly, closing the door behind him. “You’ve changed.” She didn’t move. “No. I’m just not performing anymore.” He sat in the leather chair by the fireplace. A long pause settled between them. “I miss the way you used to look at me,” he said. S

Anais didn’t cry. She didn’t scream, or tear up the papers, or demand that Cassian leave the apartment. She just… walked. Out of the vault, past the main hallway, through the quiet marble silence of a penthouse that had always felt too clean. Like a museum built to preserve something dead. She left the door open behind her. Cassian didn’t follow. Maybe he understood that for the first time, she wasn’t trying to hurt him. She just needed distance to survive him. She took the elevator to the street and started walking. No driver. No guard. No plan. Just her. The city had never looked so bright and aimless. At first, she didn’t know where she was going. But her feet remembered something her mind hadn’t caught up to yet. When she finally stopped, she was standing outside a bookstore tucked between two worn cafés on the Lower East Side. The glass was fogged, the sign crooked. She hadn’t been here since college. Inside, it smelled like old paper and nostalgia. She walked the ai

There’s a silence Anais had never heard before. Not the absence of noise, but the space between expectation and collapse. It’s the silence before something breaks. That’s what the morning felt like. She sat alone in her office at Vale Holdings, the light outside too still, too bright. Her phone buzzed, screen flashing with a number she didn’t recognize. She let it ring. Then it rang again. Same number. Something in her chest stirred. She picked up on the third try. “Anais Vale?” a deep voice asked. “Yes?” “This is Detective Moore, NYPD.” She froze. “There’s been a development in the Fallpoint investigation. We’d like you to come in.” Anais blinked slowly. “That was a sealed case.” “There’s new evidence.” She gripped the desk. “What kind of evidence?” The voice didn’t answer directly. “We’ll explain when you arrive.” Click. By the time Anais reached the station, Cassian was already there, pacing. He looked up when she entered—something dark and tight around his eyes.

The cold from the hotel room floor seeped into Anais’s spine as she stared at the photo on the screen. Her body had gone still, but her heartbeat thundered in her ears. A child. Cassian. No more than nine years old, eyes too big for his face, a bruise blooming under one of them. And beside him— Her mother. Hair pulled back. Hand gripping a pistol. The barrel pointed at something—someone—just out of frame. There was no timestamp. No caption. Just that one still frame from what looked like an old security feed. But it was enough to say everything. Anais’s voice cracked when she finally spoke. “Why does she have a gun pointed at you?” Cassian didn’t answer right away. He stepped closer to the screen slowly, as if the image might move, or breathe, or pull them into it. He didn’t look away. “I always remembered her,” he said, voice low. “Not by name. Just by presence.” He took a breath. “She was there. When my father died.” Anais turned sharply to him. “What?” Cassian kept hi