Lahat ng Kabanata ng The Worthless Ex-Wife's Revenge : Kabanata 201 - Kabanata 210

Marcus"What?" Nadia's eyes went wide as I finished narrating the story. "You did that to your wife?""Ex wife," I said quietly. Though the correction felt pointless. Like adjusting the frame on a burning picture."Marcus.""I know," I said. The words came out rough, tired and stripped of everything except the truth of them. "I know. I'm an idiot. I'm stupid. I made wrong choices every single time there was a choice to make. And I made them with my eyes open and I told myself reasons that weren't reasons." I stopped. My throat was tight. "I deserve everything that's happening to me right now. I know that."Nadia said nothing.She was sitting in the chair with her hands folded in her lap and looking at me with an expression I couldn't immediately read. Not judgment exactly. But not the absence of it either. Something more careful than both."The worst part," I said, "is that she was good. Serena was genuinely good to me. She tried. Even when I made it hard she tried." I pressed my good

Sarah"Now get up," he said. "And leave. If you come back to this property again I will not have this conversation. I will simply call the people I need to call and you will leave in a way that is significantly less comfortable than walking."He stepped back inside and the gate began to close."Please," I said one more time.The gate clicked shut.I knelt on the ground outside it for a moment.Then I got up.My knees were shaking. My face was wet and I didn't have the energy to fix it. I walked back to the road and stood there and looked at nothing for a long moment.I need to go home. To sell some of my things.I had jewellery from the early days when Marcus was still trying. A watch he had given me. Some clothes that still had value. Enough maybe to make a dent. Enough maybe to buy a few more days.I flagged a cab.---The old neighbourhood announced itself gradually.The streets narrowing. The buildings closer together, older and marked by the particular weariness of places that ne

Serena Ethan followed me upstairs.He closed the door behind us and then came to where I was standing near the window. He took my elbow gently and guided me to the chair, helped me sit. He crouched in front of me, his forearms resting on his knees, and looked at me."Why did you trust him so quickly?" he asked. "Everyone around us is a threat right now, Serena. You know that.""I saw the resemblance," I said. "It wasn't just the face, it was the birthmark. My father had it in the exact same place on the exact same arm. You can't fake that.""No," Ethan agreed slowly. "You can't.""And something in me just..." I exhaled. "Something told me he was telling the truth. I know how that sounds."Ethan was quiet for a moment. Then he said, "I know he's Mr Lawrence's son. The resemblance is too clear to argue with." He paused. "But I think someone is using him."I looked at him."Think about it," he said. "The company is already in crisis. Someone is quietly buying up your shares — we don't

Ethan It took time.More than I would have liked.Rex worked through the night — I brought him coffee twice and he barely acknowledged it. The process was delicate. You couldn't move on something like this with force or speed, not without alerting whoever was on the other side. Every approach had to look routine. Every purchase had to look like market activity.He built the counter-structure first — two layers deep, clean and fresh, nothing that could be tied back to Ashford Holdings or to me. Then he began making contact through intermediaries. Quiet offers. Generous ones.The first response came back with a counter.Rex looked at me. I told him to accept it.The second came back with silence for forty minutes, and then an acceptance.The third took the longest, nearly two hours of back and forth through layers of representatives who didn't know who they were representing. Rex was patient. I paced.At half past one in the morning, he leaned back in his chair and let out a long breat

Serena Lawrence Global rose up ahead of us as the car turned into the business district.We went in through the main entrance.The lobby staff straightened when they saw me. The receptionist at the front desk stood, and there was a small ripple of acknowledgement that moved through the room the way it always did — a subtle shift, people becoming more conscious of their posture, their expression, their proximity to whatever I was doing.I had learned to move through it without slowing down.I walked with Daniel through the lobby, into the lift, and up to the boardroom floor. My assistant met me in the corridor — tablet in hand, already talking. I listened and gave instructions without breaking stride.The board meeting was already assembled when we walked in.Twelve people around a long table. Suits, careful expressions, the particular quality of attention that people give when they're trying to read a room before committing to any position within it.I took my place at the head of