Lahat ng Kabanata ng His Billion-Dollar Regret: The Forgotten Wife Returns: Kabanata 51 - Kabanata 60

POV: Yessica | Location: EdinburghAgnes arranged everything.This was non-negotiable and Yessica had stopped trying to negotiate it by Wednesday morning when she'd found a handwritten list on the kitchen table titled Saturday — Final with seventeen items already crossed off.The shop closed at noon. By one o'clock Agnes had transformed the reading corner into something that looked entirely like itself but with bunting — deep green and cream, the colours of the shop, nothing pink, nothing infantile, nothing that suggested a woman had lost her own identity in the process of growing another person.Yessica had noticed that specifically. Had said nothing. Agnes had caught her noticing and had said obviously and moved on.Moira came first. Then Dr. Gillies, who had accepted the invitation with the mild surprise of someone not accustomed to being included in the human parts of her patients' lives, and who brought a small wrapped package and the blood pressure cuff as a joke that wasn't ent

POV: Yessica | Location: EdinburghAgnes opened the shop at nine.Normal Sunday hours. Three customers by ten-thirty. Agnes served them with her usual efficiency and zero indication that anything unusual was scheduled for eleven o'clock.Yessica came downstairs at ten-forty-five.She'd spent longer than usual getting dressed, then been irritated at herself for spending longer than usual, then worn exactly what she would have worn anyway — dark trousers, a loose grey knit that accommodated Claire without apologizing for her, her hair down. No performance. No armour.Agnes looked at her when she came through the back."Good," Agnes said. Just that.At ten fifty-eight, a black car stopped outside on Victoria Street.Yessica watched through the window.Catherine Sterling got out alone.She was dressed the way she always dressed — designer, precise, every element considered. Dark coat, leather gloves, hair perfect. But something about the scale of her was different on Victoria Street than

POV: Yessica | Location: Edinburgh"What kind of something else?" Yessica said."Dr. Gillies would prefer to explain in person." The nurse's voice was professionally careful. The specific carefulness of someone who had been told not to give information over the phone. "She's available at two o'clock this afternoon. Can you come?""Yes," Yessica said. "I'll be there."She ended the call.Stood in the back room of the bookshop with Agnes watching her face."Medical," Agnes said."Blood results. Something flagged in the secondary panel." Yessica kept her voice even. "She wants me in at two."Agnes didn't fill the silence with reassurance. That was why Yessica trusted her — she never performed calm she didn't feel, and she never weaponized the truth before it was confirmed."I'll come with you," Agnes said."You don't have to—""I'll come with you."Yessica looked at her. Nodded.She walked back to the reading corner.Catherine and Edward were both watching the doorway when she came throu

POV: Yessica | Location: EdinburghThe Royal Infirmary was twenty minutes from Victoria Street.Lewis drove her. He'd hired a car the day before — she hadn't asked why, but now she understood it was because he'd anticipated that there would be mornings when walking to Marchmont Road wasn't the right answer. He didn't say that. He just had a car.Agnes stayed at the shop.She'd handed Yessica a thermos of tea at the door without comment. Then she'd held Yessica's face in both hands for exactly two seconds — the way she did when words were insufficient — and gone inside.The Royal Infirmary was large and functional and smelled like every hospital Yessica had ever been in. They found the maternal-fetal medicine unit on the third floor. Checked in. Sat.Lewis had the book again."You're not reading it," Yessica said."No," he agreed. He didn't pretend otherwise.They waited.Dr. Hargreaves was younger than his voice suggested. Mid-forties, brisk but not cold, the manner of someone who had

POV: Yessica | Location: Royal Infirmary, EdinburghThe maternity unit was on the fourth floor.Lewis checked her in at the desk while she stood beside him and let him handle the administrative part because her hands had started shaking in the lift and she'd put them in her pockets so no one would see.He saw anyway.He didn't say anything. Just stayed close.The room was small and private and smelled like every hospital room — the particular combination of antiseptic and recycled air that meant you are being taken care of and something is happening simultaneously. A window. Grey sky. The city below doing its Monday morning.A midwife named Fiona connected the foetal monitor first. The sound filled the room immediately — Claire's heartbeat, rapid and steady and real.Both of them went still."Strong," Fiona said. "She's doing well."Yessica exhaled.Lewis sat in the chair beside the bed and said nothing and didn't need to.The IV went in next. Ursodeoxycholic acid in higher concentrat