All Chapters of After Divorce; My Billionaire Ex-Husband wants me Back: Chapter 71 - Chapter 80

Hailey’s POVThe stairwell smelled like metal and dust.Our footsteps echoed too loudly, too fast, each sound chasing the next as Dylan pulled me down the concrete steps. I struggled to keep up, my mind still spinning from what we had just heard.Selected.The word wouldn’t stop repeating in my head.My pregnancy wasn’t an accident.Our children weren’t just ours.“No,” I whispered under my breath as we descended another flight. “No, no, no…”Dylan must have heard me because his grip tightened. “Hailey, stay with me.”“How long?” I asked, breathless. “How long have you known something was wrong?”“I didn’t,” he said immediately. “I suspected. Pieces never fit. But this… this is different.”That wasn’t the answer I needed.I stopped on the landing, forcing him to stop too.“You suspected?” My voice trembled. “You suspected something about our children and never told me?”His expression twisted, torn between urgency and regret. “I thought it was about Lexa manipulating things. I didn’t

Hailey’s POVDarkness swallowed everything.Not the kind that comes at night. Not soft. Not natural.This was mechanical darkness. Intentional. Suffocating.The only sound was my own breathing, too loud in my ears, too fast.And my daughter’s small hand tightening around mine.“Mommy… they’re scared.”Her whisper sliced through me.“They?” I asked, my voice trembling.Before she could answer, emergency lights flickered back to life, dim and unstable, casting the garage in a dull red glow. Shapes reappeared. Dylan. Grant. The woman. The cars. The concrete walls.But nothing felt the same.Because now I was looking at my daughter differently.Not just with fear.With the terrifying awareness that something inside her had changed.Dylan crouched immediately in front of her, his movements careful, controlled. “What do you mean, sweetheart? Who’s scared?”She frowned slightly, like she was trying to explain something too big for words.“The voices,” she said. “They didn’t know I could hear

Hailey’s POVThe voice over the speakers cut off.Silence followed.Not relief.Not safety.The kind of silence that comes right before something breaks.Dylan’s hand slid to the back of my neck, pulling me slightly closer to him without even looking at me. The gesture was instinctive, grounding. I could feel the tension in his body, every muscle tight, ready.“Stay with me,” he murmured.“I’m not going anywhere,” I whispered back, though my pulse was racing so fast it made me lightheaded.Another violent tremor shook the building. Dust fell from the ceiling. Somewhere deep in the structure, metal groaned under pressure.“They’re breaching the outer perimeter,” Grant said, staring at the security feed. “Whoever they are, they’re not using standard access.”The woman beside him looked shaken now. Truly shaken. “They shouldn’t even know this facility exists.”Dylan’s voice was cold. “You built a secret around children. Secrets never stay buried.”I watched the monitors. Figures moving.

Hailey’s POVMy name stayed on that screen.Bright.Unmistakable.Like it had always belonged there.I couldn’t breathe.“No,” I said, but the word came out weak. “That’s wrong. That’s not me.”No one answered.Even Dylan didn’t speak.And that scared me more than the message.Because Dylan always reacted. Always fought. Always pushed back.Now he was staring at the screen like he was trying to calculate something he didn’t want to understand.“Say something,” I whispered, turning to him.His gaze shifted to me slowly. Too slowly.“They’re not identifying you as a participant,” he said. “They’re identifying you as the origin.”The floor felt unsteady beneath me.“That’s impossible,” I insisted. “I didn’t even know this place existed until today!”Grant looked like he wanted to argue.But he didn’t.The silence became its own answer.My chest tightened. “Grant… what aren’t you telling me?”He dragged a hand down his face, conflicted. “I didn’t know it was you. Not specifically. We were

Hailey’s POVThe hum didn’t stop.It deepened.It moved through the floor, into my legs, into my spine, like the building itself had a pulse and we were standing inside its chest. The sound was too low to hear properly, but my body reacted to it anyway. Every nerve felt tuned to the vibration. Every breath came shorter than the last.Terminated.The word wouldn’t leave my head.Not restrained.Not separated.Not contained.Terminated.Dylan’s hand tightened around mine again, instinctive, unthinking. He didn’t even look at me when he did it. His focus stayed on the room, on the exits, on the failing lights. But the moment our skin met, something inside me steadied.And that terrified me more than the failsafe.Because the system noticed too.“Convergence rising. Thirty-four percent.”“I didn’t do anything,” I whispered.Grant let out a strained laugh. “You breathed near each other. That’s enough now.”Another tremor rolled through the facility. This one wasn’t distant. It was close. M