All Chapters of His Billion-Dollar Regret: The Forgotten Wife Returns: Chapter 161 - Chapter 170

304 Chapters

Chapter 161: Permanently

POV: Lewis | EdinburghShe asked if he still wanted to be here.He said yes without hesitating, because it was true.She looked at him. "Then tell me what you do in the study at two in the morning."He did not answer immediately."Lewis.""I go there when I am scared," he said. "When I feel like I am failing and I cannot figure out how to stop failing. When everything is too heavy and I do not know how to bring it to you because you are already carrying so much and I do not want to add to it."She looked at him for a long moment."That is the problem," she said. "You are protecting me from your fear. And I am sitting alone in this bed thinking I am the only one who is scared."He understood what she was telling him. That his management of his own fear had made her feel alone in hers."I did not know that is how it landed," he said."I know you did not know." Her voice was even. "That is the problem."They were both quiet.Then she sat up straighter. "I need to ask you for something. I

Chapter 162: Confirmation

POV: Lewis | EdinburghThe study had a couch that was not designed for sleeping and a window that let in light at five-thirty.He knew both of these things by the third morning.He also knew that Yessica made coffee at seven, that she checked on the girls before she came downstairs, and that she had started leaving a cup on the kitchen counter without comment. Not for him. Just — on the counter. Accessible.He drank it. They did not discuss it.***The household functioned.That was what surprised him most. He had expected fracture — tension visible enough that Claire would notice, Rose would feel it, the mornings would have edges. Instead it was — ordinary.They moved through the house around each other with the specific competence of two people who had learned each other's rhythms. He handled the morning school run.She handled Rose's nine o'clock feed. They overlapped in the kitchen occasionally and spoke about practical things — the grocery order, Claire's reading folder, the conf

Chapter 163: Day Fourteen

POV: Yessica | EdinburghShe woke up knowing what day it was.Lewis was already in the kitchen when she came down. He did not say anything about it. She did not either. He made coffee, she fed Rose, Claire ate breakfast and talked about a project at school that required colored paper, and the morning moved through its sequence the way it always did.Both of them knew.Neither of them said it.***The session with Dr. Chen was at eleven.They sat in the two chairs and Dr. Chen looked at them and then said, without preamble: "It has been two weeks. Yessica, have you made a decision?""Yes," Yessica said.Lewis did not look at her. She noticed that — he was holding himself very still, not influencing the moment."I am staying," she said. "Not because everything is resolved. Not because I am certain. Because I am certain that I want to try from a real position instead of a performed one." She kept her voice even. "Two weeks ago I was managing. I was handling the house, the children, the l

Chapter 164: His Father's Secret

POV: Lewis | EdinburghHe asked the question again."What did you do?"Harrison stepped inside. Lewis closed the door.Yessica was at the top of the stairs. She came down slowly and sat at the kitchen table. She did not ask to be included. She just placed herself in the room, which was what she did when something mattered.Harrison sat down. He kept his coat on."2009," he said. "Before you took over. Sterling Industries was being evaluated for a government infrastructure contract. Significant value. I was on the panel advisory committee."Lewis waited."I also held a personal financial interest in one of the subcontractors bidding for the work," Harrison said. "A private equity position. Small, but direct. I did not disclose it to the other committee members. The subcontractor was awarded a portion of the contract." He looked at the table. "I divested the position within six months. The contract work was delivered without incident. Nothing illegal under the letter of the law at the t

Chapter 165: The Accusation

POV: Yessica | EdinburghDavid picked up on the second ring.She told him everything before he could ask. The Marcus counter-claim. The fabricated communication. The timeline. The fact that it was about to be filed and would likely be leaked before Eleanor could contain it.David was quiet for four seconds."Is there any basis for it?" he asked."A cold outreach email from Sienna's firm eighteen months ago. Advisory services. Standard unsolicited contact. I never responded.""And that is what they are calling a consulting relationship.""That is what they are calling initiated contact."She could hear him processing it. David Ng had been Bellamy Holdings' board chair for six years. He had managed crises before. She trusted his instinct on timing."We issue a statement today," he said. "Before Marcus files. Before any journalist calls us for comment. We get ahead of it." A pause. "Send me the email. The original one Sienna sent you. I want the timestamp."She pulled it up. Forwarded it

Chapter 166: The Weight He Carried

POV: Yessica | EdinburghDr. Sarah Chen opened with the question directly."Last week you said you were angry at Lewis for the Tokyo situation. I want to understand the shape of it. What specifically are you angry about?"Yessica had spent the week thinking about how to answer that. She was not someone who processed emotion by feeling it first. She processed by dissecting."Three layers," she said. "The first is the act itself. He made a choice in Tokyo. That is his. The second is that I found out after the marriage. I had already committed to a life with him before I had the full information. I stayed, but the choice to stay was made under conditions I did not fully understand." She paused. "The third is the hardest one. Ethan exists because of that night. And I have come to care about Ethan. Genuinely. Which means the thing I am angry about also produced a child I do not want to be angry at."Dr. Chen did not write anything. Just listened."All three of those things live in the same

Chapter 167: Maybe A Little Bit

POV: Lewis | EdinburghThe second morning of Ethan's two-week block started the same way every morning started.Cereal with stars. Button on the table beside the bowl. Claire eating beside him and narrating something about her week at school that Ethan listened to with the concentrated expression of someone receiving important briefings.Lewis made coffee. Yessica came down and Ethan looked up at her and said: "I told Claire about the stars. She did not know about the stars."Yessica sat down. "What did Claire say?""She said they are just cereal." He was clearly still processing this misalignment of values. "But they are stars.""They are stars," Yessica said. "Claire prefers the kind with honey."Ethan looked at Claire. "Is that true?"Claire, unbothered: "The honey ones are better."Ethan looked back at Yessica as though this conversation had revealed important information about the household's credibility.Lewis drank his coffee and did not say anything.***The couples session wa

Chapter 168: The Night He Stayed

POV: Yessica | EdinburghThey went downstairs.The house was quiet. Rose was down. Claire was down. Ethan was down, with Button positioned correctly on his left side, having said maybe.Lewis made tea, which he rarely did, which meant he needed something to do with his hands.She sat at the kitchen table."He said maybe," she said."Yes.""About me.""Yes." He brought two cups and sat down across from her. "He cited the evidence. Stars and Button protocol."She looked at her cup. "That is more than I expected.""Me too." Lewis was quiet for a moment. "I did not tell him to say it. I did not prompt it.""I know you did not." She met his eyes. "That is why it landed the way it did."The kitchen was warm and still. No phones going off. No filings pending. No one in crisis.She thought about Dr. Chen's homework. The conversation that was not about a problem."What did you want to do this year?" she said. "Before everything started. We talked about a trip. You mentioned somewhere."Lewis l

Chapter 169: What He Deserved to Hear

POV: Lewis | EdinburghCatherine was in the corridor when he arrived.Coat on. Hands folded. The composed version, except not quite — there was something in her face that the composure was sitting on top of, visible only because he had spent enough years watching her perform it to know the difference."He is stable," she said. "They have him on monitoring. His cardiologist says it is not the level of the first one.""What happened?""He had chest pain this afternoon. He called me before he called the hospital." She paused. "I do not know what to do with that information."Lewis looked at the closed door."Has he been managing stress levels?" he asked."He says yes. His cardiologist says differently." She looked at the corridor floor. "I have not been an easy person to be separated from, apparently. Even when the separation was warranted."Lewis said nothing. He went in.***Harrison was in the bed with the monitoring leads and the particular expression of a man who found hospitals pro

Chapter 170: The Price of Everything

POV: Lewis | EdinburghHe sat in the hospital car park for four minutes with Sienna's message on his screen.Then he called Eleanor.She answered on the third ring. He read the message aloud."Do not respond," she said immediately. "Not tonight.""I know that.""I mean it. Whatever Catherine asked Sienna — whether it is legitimate or another play — responding at midnight from a hospital car park is not the condition under which you make that decision." A pause. "Go home. Come to my office at nine tomorrow."He ended the call.Then he called Catherine.She answered after two rings. He heard the hospital background — she had not left."You contacted Sienna tonight," he said. "What did you ask her?"A silence."I asked if she would be willing to meet with you," Catherine said. "Not through lawyers. In person.""Why would I want that?""Because she has a complete picture of everything that happened. Every instruction, every method, every person involved from the beginning. I do not have t

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