All Chapters of She Was Never Just the Billionaire’s Wife: Chapter 321 - Chapter 330

380 Chapters

Chapter 321 Small World, Continued

(Hannah)"Okay," James says, flipping over the paper placemat. "We're doing this properly.""You brought a pen to a date?""I'm a doctor. There's always a pen."He clicks it."You said, and I quote, 'I'll say yes to dinner if you can explain how we're connected without me getting a headache.' This is me earning the appetizers."He draws a box. Writes WILL in it."My brother. Natasha's biological father."Another box."Me. Her uncle."A line down."Natasha."A line sideways."Chase. Ex-husband, current whatever they're calling it."Another line."Elijah. Chase's son.""My son.""Your son, but for my sake I hope you don’t have a square on this chart."He draws the last line, taps it."Which makes me your son's half-sister's great-uncle. No blood between you and me anywhere on this napkin. Headache?""Mild."Taking the pen, I add a box of my own."You forgot Lily. Elijah would never forgive you.""He's a good brother?""He's a besotted brother. He taught her to high-five. Took him three

Chapter 322 Casseroles

(Gloria)Natasha opens the door with a kitchen towel over one shoulder and freezes."Gloria.""Hi."My hands are sweating around the dish."I made a casserole. Apparently that's what I do now when I can't say things. Julian has four. You get one."She steps back to let me in.Doesn't ask why I'm here, doesn't make it easy or hard.Just walks to the kitchen and puts the kettle on, like six weeks of me dodging her calls isn't sitting on the counter between us.Lily's playpen is in the living room. Empty."She's napping," Natasha says, watching me look. "Twenty more minutes, usually.""Okay."My voice breaks on the second syllable."Okay. Good. That gives me twenty minutes to get this out without crying in front of her. I know how sensitive she is.""Gloria, you don't have to-""I do. Sit down, you're hovering."She sits.I stay standing, because if I sit I'll cry before I've earned it."I've been avoiding you since the miscarriage. You noticed. Everyone noticed. Nathanial started making

Chapter 323 The Program

(Sonia)There's a printed program on my pillow.An actual program printed on cardstock.An Evening With Liam: A Retrospective In Three Acts, with a curtain time, an intermission, and a dress code that just says "devastating.""You made a program.""I made a commemorative program."He's in the doorway in a shirt he ironed.Which is extra impressive because I've seen his ironing board, it's a towel on the floor.He’s holding two glasses of something sparkling."One week since the wrap party. Some boring men would get flowers and chocolate. I built you an evening of theatre.""It says Act One is a dramatic reading.""Of the first scene you ever auditioned with, yes. I play all the other parts. I've been rehearsing accents.""Liam.""There's a Scottish sea captain in it now. He wasn't in the original text. I felt his absence."God help me, I love this ridiculous man.Haven't said that word yet.Neither of us has, it's sitting in the room like furniture we walk around.But it's there every

Chapter 324 Making the Table Bigger

(Natasha)"He's had thirds," my mother says awe-struck, watching Elijah demolish Gloria's roast."Where does it go?""He's thirteen. It’s metabolized before it even reaches his stomach."Sunday lunch at Gloria and Nathanial's has been reinstated, and the table has never been this full.Chairs have had to be brought in from the kitchen.Lily's high chair is wedged between mine and Chase's.Gloria's been up seven times to refill things and refuses all help.Nothing new there.Nathanial keeps touching her hand when she moves past him, and the smile she gives him every time reassures me more than words ever could.They’re going to be okay.Julian's here.First time he’s been in a group setting since Taylor.He's quiet, parked at the corner seat with a plate he's mostly rearranging, but he's here.And when Liam launched into his one-man account of the program incident, heavily redacted, thank god, though Sonia still went scarlet, Julian's mouth twitched.Twice.I'm counting."So then inter

Chapter 325 The Pantry

(Elijah)The driver doesn't talk.Forty minutes, not one word, and the gates we drive through are taller than the ones at my school.Mom said I could bail any time.One text, she'd come get me, even if it means letting a patient bleed out on the operating table.I don’t think she’d actually do that, but I appreciate the sentiment.I type here in our chat, considering whether to pre-type a rescue-me message just in case.The front door is already open.Elias Warren is standing in it with a cane he I’m not convinced he actually needs, because he was standing up straight in the doorway until he saw the car.I think he just likes having a weapon to wield."You're late.""Practice ran over. Coach made us do-""I'm aware. My driver informed me. I was making conversation."He turns and walks inside."Come. Wipe your feet, otherwise the housekeeper nags at me."The hallway is almost the size of our whole house.Paintings everywhere.Old guys in ruffled collars, one boat, a horse that looks ve

Chapter 326 Finding Out

(Nathanial)Gloria waits until the dishwasher's running.She always picks her moment by noise.Hard things get said under cover of something humming."I want to talk about the other way."My hands go still in the sink.Six weeks I've been waiting for a version of this sentence.Now it's here and I'm holding a wet colander like an idiot."Okay."I set it down and dry my hands."Talking. I’m up for that."She's at the table with two glasses of wine already poured, which means she's been planning this since lunch."Adoption."The word comes out steady.She's rehearsed it."I want us to look into adoption."I know my wife. She’s already researched the hell out of adoption before bringing it up to me."Okay.""That's it? Okay?""That's a hell yes, Gloria. It's always been a yes. I was waiting for you to be ready."Her chin wobbles once.She takes a drink instead of letting it turn into anything."I need to say the rest of it. Don't help me."She straightens the coaster, lining it up with t

Chapter 327 Concessions

(Natasha)The popcorn machine officially hates me.Forty parents, one cash box, a folding table with a wobble, and a machine that Hannah has already fixed twice without being asked.She does it the way she probably does surgery.No fanfare. Two perfectly executed moves. Done."You have to hold the kettle release gently," she says."I was holding it.""You were strangling it."I stepped in dropped caramel ten minutes ago, so my left heel now sticks to the concrete with every step I take.Whoever decided a soccer fundraiser was heels territory should be fired.It was me.I dressed myself this morning.If I fire myself I get to leave the second circle of hell that I’m currently trapped in.I’ll also disappoint Elijah and he was so excited when he heard his mom and I would be working the same shift at the concession stand.Suck it up, Natasha.Out on the field, Elijah's team is up by one.Elijah just cleared a ball off the line and jogged back like it was nothing, and both of us cheered l

Chapter 328 Out of the Cave

(Julian)"You got a haircut," Natasha says at the door, like I've committed something."I got a haircut.""And that's a new shirt.""It's a three-year-old shirt. It just hasn't been out much lately. Neither have I. We're reintegrating together."I hold up the bottle I brought."Am I allowed in, or is the inspection ongoing?"She steps aside.The townhouse smells like whatever's in the oven, and Lily's on the rug in the living room, upright against the coffee table, supervising her blocks like middle management.Six weeks since the funeral.Give or take.I've stopped counting in days, which the grief pamphlet Piper mailed me, mailed, with a stamp, like it's 1994, says is progress.The pamphlet also says to "rejoin your social circle."So here I am.Rejoining.I did Sunday lunch at Gloria’s, which was easier because there were so many people and the attention wasn’t focused on me.Now I’m doing Tuesday dinner at Natasha's, the training-wheels version of a life."You look better," she sa

Chapter 329 Alignment

(Chloe)"So the amethyst is forty," Natasha says, "And the raw amethyst is sixty-five?"The crystal vendor nods.She's got a nose ring and the patience of a saint, but she has no idea what's coming."Same stone. Less work done to it. Costs more.""Raw pieces carry the earth's original frequency.""Mm. What's your supplier markup on original frequency?"I sip my pineapple and ginger juice and watch.This was supposed to be a relaxing evening.Sound bath at seven, crystal workshop after, my treat, because Natasha hasn’t sat down in weeks and she deserves a break.Instead she's doing hostile due diligence on a woman selling rose quartz off a fold-out table.“She’s just trying to make a living,” I say very quietly.It has the intended effect, she takes a deep breath the fight drains out of her."I think," Natasha says, "That you could increase your profits if you bundle a candle with one of the mid-range geodes. Cobble together something about sandalwood and-and the pink rock thing workin

Chapter 330 Due Diligence

(Mason)"You ordered for me," I say, sitting down."You always get the same thing. I saved us four minutes."Natasha slides a menu out of my reach anyway, like I might rebel."I have a one o'clock.""So this is you pretending to spend time with me between appointments.""This is an ambush. The food's a courtesy."Great.She's got her deal face on, the one she used to break the Hartwell guys with.I don’t particularly like having it aimed at me and I can’t think of a single thing I’ve done that I need to be taken to task about."Fine. What are you selling me?"She waits for the water guy to leave."Chloe."The name lands and I do the thing I've gotten good at, which is nothing.I pick up my fork and examine it like it’s a modern marvel.“I already accidentally got her pregnant, what more would you like me to do?” I ask mildly.That earns me a scowl."We went out Thursday," she says. "Sound bath. I bought a rock out of guilt.""She told me. She said you fixed the crystal lady's whole bu

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