Alle Kapitel von Unmatched Wife: Not His To Claim Anymore: Kapitel 151 – Kapitel 160

Chapter 151RIVERA "Okay," she agreed. She looked at her notes, then back at me. "Now tell me what you're actually thinking. Not the logistics version. The real version."I'd been waiting for her to ask that. Had been carrying the real version for most of the day, behind the logistics and the security updates and the careful attention to Louis."I keep thinking about Matthew," I said.She was still."Not—" I stopped, found the right framing. "Not in the way that suggests I'm threatened by him. I'm thinking about him as a factor. As a person I've been treating as an obstacle or a variable and not as—" I paused. "He's a man who's been trying to become something better than what he was. Who moved to another city for months because his son needed it. Who's standing up in front of his whole pack to say the true thing instead of the comfortable thing." I looked at the table. "And he's going to walk into that assembly in six days without knowing the full picture of what's waiting for him."

Chapter 153MATTHEWHe was talking as we walked from the car to the school entrance. Not about anything momentous—about which of Daniel's books was the best one, about whether Sophie's dog would know how to behave at a sleepover, about a project Mrs. Patterson had announced involving something he described as "very important research into habitats." He was talking the way he'd talked in the before-times, the easy continuous narration of a child who had things to say and trusted they'd be listened to.I listened.At the entrance, I caught movement in my peripheral vision. Callahan, in dark work trousers and a grey jacket, pushing a cleaning supply trolley down the corridor visible through the open main doors. Moving with the unhurried competence of someone who'd been doing this job for years and had no particular reason to be anywhere other than exactly where he was.I met his eyes for exactly the duration of a nod. He returned it with the same economy and pushed the trolley around the

Chapter 155MATTHEWI looked at her for a long moment. I thought about Dr. Martinez's assessment—the coercion hypothesis, the possibility that Mia was a lever being used by someone else, the behavioral escalation that didn't fit her established patterns.I thought about the frightened thing I'd seen in her expression, one second before she'd closed it off."I won't call the police today," I said. "But Mia, hear me when I say this. If you come near Theo again—if you approach him, follow him, use anyone else to get access to him—I will stop being merciful. I don't care what else is happening in your life. He is off limits."She looked at me with an expression I couldn't fully read. Something that was more than hurt and less than anger. "You're choosing a dead woman over me," she said quietly."I'm choosing my son," I said. "And yes, I'm choosing Bianca's memory. Because whatever I failed to give her when she was alive, I can at least do right by what she left behind." I moved to the doo

Chapter 157BIANCAThe first thing I noticed was the pain.It started at the back of my head and spread forward like something heavy was pressing against the inside of my skull. My thoughts felt slow and thick, like they were moving through water. I tried to open my eyes and immediately regretted it because even the dim light in the room felt like needles.I closed them again and stayed still, trying to remember how to breathe normally.In. Out. In. Out.The second thing I noticed was that I couldn't move my hands.I tested this carefully, without opening my eyes, without making any visible movement that might signal to anyone watching that I was awake. My wrists were bound behind my back, something rough against my skin that felt like rope. My ankles were tied too, crossed and secured to what I was sitting on, which felt like a wooden chair with a solid back.The third thing I noticed was the barrier.This one wasn't something I could see or touch. It was something I felt, the way I

Chapter 159BIANCATen days. The ritual window."And Louis?" I said, and my voice came out steadier than I felt. "You said the same thing—""The boy will have a visitor soon," Voss said. "Another excellent piece of work. His will be somewhat simpler because children are less perceptive about the fine details of adults than adults are about each other." She paused. "And the Morrison boy. We have arrangements in place for him as well." She looked at me with the calm of someone who'd thought through every angle for a very long time. "By the time anyone realizes what's actually happened, we'll have everything we need.""Theo is four years old," I said. My voice was quiet. "He's four years old and he's already been through—""I know how old he is," Voss said, without particular feeling. "And I understand that you're his mother, and that this is painful to contemplate. But Bianca, this work is larger than any individual. What the ritual makes possible—the stability it creates, the consolida