Semua Bab I Got Pregnant For The Wrong Twin: Bab 141 - Bab 150

ADRIANThe penthouse is too quiet.That's the thing about living alone in a space designed for two. Every empty room echoes. Every silence stretches too long. Every corner holds a memory of someone who isn't there anymore.I stand at the floor to ceiling windows and watch the city below. New York at night is a thing of beauty, all those lights and movement and lives being lived. I grew up in this city, built an empire in it, fell in love in it. And now it feels like a cage.My phone buzzes. I glance at it without moving.Serena: Hope took her first steps today. Three whole steps before she fell. Aiden got it on video. I'll send it later.I stare at the message. Read it three times. Feel the familiar ache spread through my chest.I type back quickly. That's amazing. Can't wait to see it.Simple. Supportive. The kind of thing a brother in law should say. Not the things I actually feel, the words that live in my throat and never come out. I should be there. I should be watching her take

AIDENThe second casserole came three days later.I found it on our front porch in the morning, no note, no text, no warning. Just a ceramic dish covered in foil, sitting there like an offering. I stood in the doorway with Hope on my hip, staring at it, trying to convince myself it could have been anyone. A different neighbor, maybe. Someone who'd heard we had a new baby and wanted to be kind.But I knew. The same way I'd known when Vanessa's texts started, when she showed up at the gate, when she talked about my family like she'd been studying me. Some instinct I'd developed over years of being watched, analyzed, pursued. Some animal sense for when someone had decided you were something they wanted.I brought the dish inside. Set it on the counter. Stared at it.Hope reached for the foil. I pulled her hand away gently."That's not for you," I murmured.She babbled something indignant and tried again.I texted Serena instead of calling, because she was in a meeting and I didn't want t

SERENAThe woman from the Facebook post was named Michelle Chen.It took Aiden three days to find her. Three days of digging through old neighborhood association records, of calling numbers that had been disconnected, of following a trail that had gone cold years ago. Three days of me trying to focus on work and failing, of jumping every time my phone buzzed, of watching the blue house like it might sprout legs and walk onto our lawn.When he finally got a number, he handed me the phone without a word.I stared at it. "What do I say?""The truth. That's all we have."I called. A woman answered on the fourth ring, her voice cautious, the voice of someone who didn't answer unknown numbers often."Hello?""Michelle Chen?" I gripped the phone tighter. "My name is Serena Knight. I'm calling about a neighborhood in Miami. Magnolia Lane. I think you used to live there."The silence on the other end was long enough that I thought she'd hung up."I haven't thought about that place in years," s

SERENAThe quiet that settled over Magnolia Lane after Vanessa left was the kind of quiet I hadn't known I'd been missing. Not the tense, watchful quiet of waiting for something to happen. The real quiet. The kind that let you hear yourself think.I started sleeping through the night again. Started walking to the mailbox without checking the blue house first. Started letting Hope play in the front yard without hovering at her shoulder, ready to scoop her up and run inside. The wariness that had lived in my chest for months began to loosen, day by day, like a knot slowly coming undone.Aiden noticed the change. He didn't say anything, not directly, but I caught him watching me sometimes with an expression I couldn't quite name. Relief, maybe. Or recognition. Like he was seeing the person he'd fallen in love with finally come back to herself.The bakery was busier than ever. Lily and Arya had been managing without me for so long that having me back full time meant we could finally tackl

SERENAThe fight started over something stupid. They always do.It was a Tuesday, which meant I'd been at the bakery since four in the morning, training a new hire who couldn't tell the difference between a buttercream and a ganache. By the time I got home, my feet were throbbing, my hair smelled like vanilla extract, and I'd been running on caffeine and stubbornness for twelve hours. All I wanted was a hot shower and five minutes of silence.What I got was Aiden standing in the kitchen with Hope on his hip and an expression on his face I'd learned to recognize over the past year. The one that meant he'd been waiting to have a conversation I didn't want to have."Hey," I said, dropping my bag by the door. "Rough day. Can we talk later?""We've been saying later for three weeks." His voice was calm, the way it got when he was trying not to be angry. "Every time I try to talk to you, you're too tired or too busy or too something. So no. We can't talk later."I stopped in the doorway of