All Chapters of EX-HUSBAND'S REGRET (It's Too Late To Apologise): Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

104 Chapters

Captivity

I woke to Charlotte's crying. My body ached. Every muscle screamed in protest as I shifted on the thin mattress. The concrete floor beneath had offered no cushioning, no comfort. How long had I slept? Minutes? Hours? The single bulb still burned overhead. Same dim light. Same concrete walls. Same dirt floor. We were still here. Still trapped. Charlotte's cries grew louder. Desperate. She was hungry. I sat up carefully, my head spinning. When had I last eaten? Last drank water? I couldn't remember. "Shh, baby. Mama's here." I adjusted my shirt and positioned Charlotte for nursing. She latched on immediately, her tiny hands gripping my shirt. "That's it. You're okay. We're okay." But we weren't okay. We were in a basement. Somewhere in the middle of nowhere

The Call

Damien placed a phone on the mattress beside me.Not my phone. A burner. Cheap. Untraceable."Call him." His voice was calm. Too calm. "Tell Sterling you're leaving him. That you're coming back to me. That you and Charlotte belong with me now."I stared at the phone. My hands trembled."I can't.""You can. You will." He crouched in front of me. "Unless you want me to hurt her. Because I will, Elena. I've killed before. Two of your babies. What's one more?"Charlotte slept in my arms. Peaceful. Unaware of the monster threatening her life."Okay." The word barely came out. "Okay, I'll call him.""Good girl." He picked up the phone. Dialed a number from memory. Calloway's number. "Remember—sound convincing. Tell him you're leaving him for me. That you realized you made a mistake. That you want your old life back."The phone rang. Once. Twice.Then Calloway's voice. Desperate. Broken.

Unexpected Ally

Sienna Brooks stood at the bottom of the stairs, her eyes scanning the basement until they landed on me. On Charlotte. Her expression was unreadable. Cold. Determined. "Oh, there you are, Damien." She called up the stairs. Her voice echoed through the concrete space. "I've been looking for you." My heart hammered against my ribs. No. Not Sienna too. Not another person working with Damien. Footsteps thundered down the stairs. Damien appeared, his face lighting up when he saw her. "Sienna!" He moved toward her, relief evident in his voice. "You found us. I wasn't sure if you'd—" "Of course I found you." Sienna's smile was tight. Controlled. "You think I'd let you handle this alone? After everything we've been through?" Everything they'd been through? My stomach twisted. Sienna was working with him.

Escape Plan

The hours crawled by with agonizing slowness. Each minute felt like an eternity. Each second stretched until I thought I might scream just to break the suffocating silence. Damien had eventually come back downstairs after his phone call with whoever he'd been coordinating with. He'd brought us food—stale bread that tasted like cardboard, bottled water that was lukewarm, and some crackers that crumbled into dust between my fingers. He'd checked on Charlotte, tried to play the doting father role that made my skin crawl and my stomach turn with revulsion. "She's beautiful," he'd said, touching her soft cheek with fingers that had killed. That had murdered my daughters. That had pushed me down stairs. "She looks just like me, doesn't she?" I'd bitten my tongue until I tasted blood. Forced myself to nod. To play along. Because what choice did I have? Charlotte's life depended on my cooperatio

Sienna's Sacrifice

The gunshot still echoed in my ears. The ringing wouldn't stop. It filled my head, drowning out everything else. For a moment—one terrible, endless moment—I couldn't hear anything. Couldn't see anything. Couldn't think. Someone had fallen. Someone was on the ground. Charlotte was still screaming in my arms. Still alive. Still breathing. That meant the bullet hadn't hit her. Thank God. Thank God. But then who— "Sienna!" The name tore from my throat. She was on the ground. Crumpled against the concrete floor. Her hand pressed to her shoulder. Dark liquid seeped between her fingers. Blood. So much blood. "No. No, no, no—" I started toward her. "Don't!" Sienna's voice was strained. Pained. But fierce. "Run! Elena, run!" Damien stood frozen. The gun still raised. Smoke curling from the barrel. He was staring at Sienna like he couldn't quite believe what he'd done.

Calloway's Entrance

The standoff felt eternal. Time had stopped. Or maybe it was moving too fast. I couldn't tell anymore. All I knew was the gun pressed against my temple, Charlotte's weight in my arms, and Calloway's gray eyes locked on mine from across the basement. "Let them go, Anderson." Calloway's voice remained steady. Controlled. But I could hear the rage beneath it. Carefully leashed. Barely restrained. "This is your last chance." "My last chance?" Damien laughed. The sound echoed off concrete walls. Harsh. Bitter. "You're not in a position to make demands, Sterling. I'm the one with the gun. I'm the one with your wife and daughter. I'm the one with all the power here." "You have nothing." Calloway took a single step forward. Immediately, Damien's arm tightened around my throat. The gun pressed harder. I gasped, struggling to breathe. "Another step and she dies!" Damien screamed. "I'll do it! Don't test me!" Call

The Shot

The shot echoed through the collapsing basement. For a moment, I felt nothing. No pain. No sensation. Just the deafening ring in my ears and Charlotte's screams and the knowledge that something terrible had just happened. Then fire erupted in my arm. Burning. Searing. A line of pure agony across my left bicep. I looked down. Blood. Dark red spreading across my sleeve. The fabric torn. Skin beneath split open. He'd shot me. Damien had actually shot me. But I was still standing. Still conscious. Still holding Charlotte. The bullet had grazed me. Just grazed me. An inch to the right and it would have gone through my skull. An inch lower and it might have hit Charlotte. But it hadn't. We were alive. Everything happened in rapid succession after that. "Shots fired! Shots fired!" Lieutenant Parker's voice rang out from somewhere near the tunnel. Red laser sights painted

Hospital Reunions

The emergency room was a blur of white coats and fluorescent lights and the constant beeping of monitors. They'd taken me straight to a treatment room. Clean. Sterile. Safe. Such a stark contrast to the concrete basement where I'd spent the last terrifying hours. A doctor examined my arm. Older. Calm. The kind of steady presence that probably talked people through crises every single day. "You're very lucky," she said, cleaning the wound with careful precision. "The bullet just grazed you. Superficial tissue damage. No arterial involvement. No muscle damage. No nerve damage." Lucky. That word again. I'd been shot and she was calling me lucky. But she was right. An inch to the right and I'd be dead. An inch down and Charlotte might have been hit. "It's going to hurt for a while," the doctor continued, applying antibiotic ointment. "And you'll have a scar. B

Sienna's Loss

The surgeon's words hung in the air like a death sentence. "Something about her pregnancy?" Marcus repeated. His voice hollow. Confused. "What do you mean?" The surgeon glanced at me. At Calloway. At Charlotte sleeping peacefully in my arms. Then back to Marcus. "Perhaps we should discuss this privately—" "No." Marcus's voice was firm despite the tremor running through it. "They're family. Whatever you need to say, you can say in front of them." The surgeon nodded. "The fetus showed signs of severe developmental abnormalities. Our prenatal specialist examined the tissue and found multiple genetic defects that would have been incompatible with life outside the womb." Marcus staggered. I reached out with my free hand to steady him. He gripped my arm like a lifeline. "What kind of defects?" His voice cracked. "Neural tube defects. Cardiac abnormalities. Chromosomal issues." The surgeon's tone rem

The Full Truth

The hospital room felt smaller with each revelation. Marcus paced beside Sienna's bed, his fists clenched so tight his knuckles had gone white. "He blackmailed you." Marcus's voice was low. Dangerous. "For months. Using footage of your assault." Sienna nodded weakly. "He said if I didn't play along—if I didn't pretend to be his girlfriend, pretend to be pregnant with his baby—he'd send the edited video to everyone. To your business partners. To our family's remaining friends. To the media." "What did he make you do?" I asked quietly. Sienna's eyes closed. "Everything. He made me help him forge Elena's signatures on documents. Made me stand by during the gender reveal party. Made me smile while he destroyed her life." Her voice dropped to barely a whisper. "He made me watch when he pushed her down the stairs." The room went silent except for the steady beep o

...

4 5 6 7 8

...

SCAN CODE TO READ ON APP