Semua Bab She died a wife, Returned a flame: Bab 31 - Bab 40

Adrian’s POVThe house is quiet tonight, but not in the way a home should be. It is the kind of quiet that feels like a challenge, the kind that makes you want to find its source. My study is a mess of contracts and papers I can no longer focus on. I keep staring at the same page, and every time I blink, it is not the words that come back but her face. Rachel. The maid who moves as if she belongs nowhere and yet everywhere at once.I should not even be thinking of her. I have spent years building walls around my life, keeping everything compartmentalized: work, reputation, women. But since Rachel arrived, those walls have begun to shift. She is efficient, polite, unobtrusive, yet there is something about her that reminds me of someone I lost. Someone I once thought was mine. Sheila.The name hits me even though I do not say it aloud. Sheila. The wife who died in a fire. The woman I buried while the world offered me sympathy I could not bear. I tell myself it is a coincidence. Rachel o

Sheila’s POVInside these walls, I could wear my mask, keep my head down, and pretend to be a servant with no voice. Out there, however, I was stepping onto ground soaked in secrets, greed, and betrayal.I had seen pieces of it already. The false accounts, the missing numbers in his ledgers, the bank statements that never aligned. Adrian had been laundering money for years, using schemes so elaborate they looked like art on paper. He was not just a husband who betrayed me, not just a man who set fire to his wife. He was a criminal, and that was the side of him most people never saw.Until tonight.The staff had been buzzing all day about an important guest arriving for dinner and Vanessa spent hours in front of her mirror, painting her face and smoothing her hair into a flawless wave.“Make sure the dining room glows,” she snapped at me as I set the long mahogany table. “He is not just a business partner. He is family to Adrian. Do not ruin it.”Family. The way she said it made my ski

(Sheila’s POV)I had almost convinced myself that the past was finally buried. Every careful step I had taken since waking up in Rachel Zane’s body had been meant to secure my place here, in Adrian’s mansion, at Adrian’s side. My revenge was unfolding like a patient storm. Yet the moment I heard his voice echoing across the marble hallway, my chest tightened.Dr. Sebastian Wolfe.The man who had knocked Rachel down that fateful night, the man whose mistake had become my second chance at life, stood at the doorway speaking with Adrian’s butler. I froze halfway down the corridor, the tray of linens clutched tightly in my hands. His presence here was no coincidence.I thought I had been careful with the phone he gave me. Too careful, perhaps. I never once called, never once replied to his messages. I had hidden the device deep in my room, switching it off so it could not betray me. But Sebastian had not forgotten. He had come.The butler, Mr. Peters, announced his name in his usual stiff

Vanessa’s POVThe house felt heavier every day, as if Rachel’s presence clung to the walls. I watched her carefully from the shadows, the way she moved through the halls with her quiet steps, the way Adrian’s eyes strayed toward her even when I was right beside him. She was not an ordinary maid. I knew it in my bones.But suspicion was not enough. Suspicion could be dismissed, laughed off, silenced by Adrian with a wave of his hand. If I wanted proof, I had to dig deeper. That was when I decided to hire someone.Late in the evening, when Adrian was still in his study and Rachel was cleaning somewhere, I slipped into the lounge with my phone. I made the call with practiced ease, my voice calm even though my pulse raced.“Mr. Hall,” I said when the line connected. “I need you to do something discreet for me.”The man on the other end chuckled. “Discreet is my specialty, Mrs. Drake. Who is the target this time?”“Rachel,” I whispered, as if the name itself was dangerous. “The new maid. I

(Adrian’s POV)Vanessa’s shrill voice bounced against the walls of my study. She looked like a storm unhinged, her face red, her fists clenched at her sides. “No regard for me anymore, Adrian, with the maid?!”The words were venom, but all I felt was irritation. Her presence was an interruption, nothing more. My eyes slid to Rachel, still standing close to me, her arm brushing against mine. The image of her startled face burned into me, and the strange burn in my chest flared hotter.Vanessa’s voice rose again, sharp as shattered glass. “How dare you? I am your wife, and you stand here with a servant like she is…”“Enough,” I snapped, my voice low but cutting. I saw her flinch. Good.Her fury twisted into disbelief. “You are defending her?”I looked at Rachel, her eyes lowered, her lips parted as if she wanted to explain herself but dared not. She did not move, did not speak, only stood there with the quiet dignity that made her glow brighter than anyone else in this house. Even in si