جميع فصول : الفصل -الفصل 210

Eleanor's POVThe police came for Lucas at dawn, breaking down his apartment door while he was still passed out drunk on his couch, and by the time I heard about it through Damian's phone call he was already in custody being processed on charges that would likely keep him in prison for the rest of his life."The man who attacked Scarlet gave Lucas up immediately," Damian explained, his voice hoarse from pain and exhaustion. "Showed them text messages, money transfers, everything. Lucas is being charged with conspiracy to commit assault, attempted murder since Scarlet was pregnant and the attack could have killed the babies, and about ten other felonies I can't remember right now.""Is he getting bail?""No. Judge denied it. He's being held at county until trial."After hanging up I sat in my hotel room trying to understand how we'd gotten here, how my son had gone from bitter and vindictive to actually hiring someone to hurt his brother's pregnant wife, and I couldn't find a path thro

Scarlet's POVThe NICU became my entire world in a way that nothing else had ever been, not even the hospital room where I'd spent weeks on bedrest, because at least then I'd been the patient with some illusion of control over my own body. Here I was just a visitor watching machines keep my babies alive while I stood helpless behind plastic walls.Every day was a battle measured in ounces and oxygen levels and the terrifying silence that came when alarms stopped beeping because that meant either the crisis had passed or gotten worse and you couldn't know which until a nurse came running.Ethan was doing better than Elena from the start, his two pounds three ounces giving him just enough advantage that his lungs could handle breathing with less support, his digestive system could process the minuscule amounts of breast milk they fed him through tubes without rejecting it. He still had wires and monitors covering his tiny body but there was something in the way he moved, these small pur

Damian's POVEthan's car seat looked like it could swallow him whole.I stood in the NICU holding this piece of equipment that was supposedly designed for infants but which seemed absurdly oversized for my four-pound son, trying to figure out how to secure him in a way that wouldn't let him slip through the straps or crush his still-fragile ribcage."Like this," the nurse said, demonstrating with practiced efficiency how to thread the straps between his legs and over his shoulders, how to roll up receiving blankets to pad the sides so his head didn't flop around. "See? He fits. He's small but he's safe."Safe felt like a relative term when you were talking about a baby who nine weeks ago had been born so premature that his skin was translucent and his lungs couldn't breathe on their own. But the discharge paperwork was signed, the medical equipment was loaded in my car, and apparently we were actually doing this—taking our twins home after two months of living in this hospital.Scarle

Scarlet's POVI'd been awake since three in the morning trying to decide what to wear to testify against the father of my child, which felt absurd because what did clothing matter when you were about to sit in a courtroom and describe how someone you'd once loved had hired a man to kill you and your unborn babies.Damian found me standing in our closet at five AM holding two different blouses like the choice between navy and gray was the most important decision I'd ever make."Scarlet, you need to sleep. The trial doesn't start until nine.""I can't sleep. Every time I close my eyes I see that man with the knife standing over me."He took the blouses from my hands and hung them back up, then pulled me against his chest in a way that made me realize I was shaking."You don't have to do this. The prosecutor said your testimony would help but they have enough evidence without it. You can stay home with the babies and let them handle it.""And then what? Lucas gets convicted without me ha

Scarlet's POVElena was screaming at four in the morning because of course she was, her tiny furious voice cutting through the baby monitor and pulling me out of the first deep sleep I'd managed in weeks, and when I stumbled into the nursery I found Ethan still peacefully asleep in his crib completely unbothered by his sister's rage."You have your father's temperament," I told Elena as I lifted her from the crib, her face red and scrunched with indignation at whatever injustice had woken her—hunger or a wet diaper or just the general unfairness of being six months old. "Calm and patient while your sister loses her mind over nothing."She latched onto the bottle I'd prepared, her small hands gripping my fingers like she was afraid I might take it away before she was finished. Ethan would sip peacefully, take breaks to look around the room, sometimes fall asleep mid-feeding. Elena attacked every bottle like it was a personal challenge she was determined to win."Your brother got your f