Lahat ng Kabanata ng THE EX-WIFE MAKES A COMEBACK : Kabanata 111 - Kabanata 120

(Lena’s POV)I was in the kitchen, trying to fix myself a bowl of mixed fruits when the first real contraction slammed into me.I gasped, and my eyes immediately went to the half-packed hospital bag that had been sitting on the counter for days. The doctor had said it could be any time this week, so I’d kept the bag ready by the door. It contained baby clothes, toiletries, and the small blanket we’d picked out. I gripped the edge of the counter as the pain wrapped around my lower back and squeezed hard, pulling a sharp breath out of me. It wasn’t like the Braxton Hicks I’d been having, this one meant real business.“Shit,” I muttered, breathing through the pain like I was taught in antenatal until it eased. My hands were shaking as I reached for my phone. I dialed Adrian without thinking twice.He answered immediately “Babe? Is everything okay?”“It’s time,” I said, gasping. The contraction Just started. Get here now.”“Goodness! I’m leaving the office. Give me minutes tops.”I hung

(Lena’s POV)“Adrian, where did I put the remote for the TV in the nursery?” I asked, standing in the middle of the room with the baby fussing in my arms. She had been crying on and off since dawn, and my head felt thick, like rags had been stuffed behind my eyes. I shifted her weight, trying to rock her the way I remembered from the hospital, but my arms moved clumsy.Adrian looked up from the bottle he was warming at the small warmer on the dresser. “We don’t have a TV in the nursery, Lena. You said you didn’t want one in here.”I stopped rocking. The words lingered not fitting. I looked around the room again, my eyes scanning the shelves and the changing table. “No, I know we do. I watched something on it yesterday while I fed her. Some show about… about houses or something.” My voice trailed, the details slipping away as I spoke. The baby whimpered louder, and I tried to settle her against my shoulder, but she arched her back and cried harder. “Why won’t she calm down? She was fin

(Lena’s POV)I woke up screaming.The sound tore out of my throat before my eyes were even open, raw and filling the dark bedroom. My heart pounded so hard it felt like it would crack my ribs. The sheets were twisted tight around my legs like they were trying to trap me. For one terrifying moment I had no idea where I was. The room felt wrong and panic flooded me instantly.“They’re coming!” I cried, scrambling backward until my back slammed against the headboard. “I have to run. I have to disappear again before he finds me. I can’t let him take everything!”Adrian was already sitting up beside me, his arms reaching for me carefully but firmly. This wasn’t the first time. It had been happening for over a week now, sometimes twice in one night. “Babe, it’s me. You’re safe. You’re home. Breathe with me.”I pushed against his chest, fear making my arms strong. “Don’t touch me! You’re not supposed to be here. This isn’t my house. I erased everything — the name, the papers, the old life —

(Lena’s POV)It was a bright Monday morning, and out of the blues, I got the urge to work. I opened the laptop on the small desk in the corner of the living room that I hadn't touched for as long as my declining brush could remember. It came up and I waited for the screen to load. It soon came up and after inputting a password I'm sure remembering was a miracle, rows of unread emails filled the inbox, subject lines full of numbers and short codes I should have understood. I clicked on the first one and scanned the opening lines. Something about quarterly performance and trial updates. The sender name at the top was Elena, listed as CFO.I stared at the screen for a long moment. The name BioGen sat at the top of several messages, but it felt like it belonged to a different person. I scrolled down slowly, reading more senders, more subject lines. All of them mentioned BioGen. All of them came from Elena.I looked across the room. Elena sat in the rocking chair, the baby held against

(Elena's POV)The baby was asleep in the sling against my chest.I've learned to type one-handed over the past month. My left hand on the keyboard, and the right hand supporting her weight through the fabric. She didn't mind the movement. She seemed to like it actually. The gentle bounce of my typing put her to sleep most mornings.My laptop was balanced on a pillow in my lap. The guest room bed turned into a makeshift office. The European headquarters review meeting was happening on screen. Twelve faces in little boxes looking at me while I presented the operations report."Revenue is up fourteen percent from last quarter," I said, scrolling through the presentation with my one free hand. "The ALS trial expansion added three new sites in Germany. Patient enrollment exceeded projections by eighteen percent."Dr. Tanaka unmuted himself to speak. "The data from the German sites is particularly strong. We're seeing consistent results across all three facilities.""Good. That'll strengthe