All Chapters of His Rejected Billionaire Wife : Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

86 Chapters

Chapter Thirty One

Lena's POVI called Cara on Friday night.She picked up after two rings and said nothing for a moment, which told me she had been waiting for the call and hadn't prepared what to say when it came."I know about Monday," I said. "Ethan told me.""I was going to tell you myself." Her voice was careful. "I didn't know how.""You didn't have to tell me. It's your decision.""It affects you.""It strengthens the case. That affects me." I paused. "I'm not calling to talk about what it means. I'm calling because you're doing something difficult and I wanted you to know I know that."She was quiet for a moment. When she spoke again her voice had changed — less managed, closer to something real."Are we going to be okay?" she said. "Eventually."I didn't answer quickly. I thought about the letter. The four drafts. The door I had left open without swinging it wide."I don't know yet," I said. "But I'm not closing anything."That was all I had. She said she understood and we hung up and I sat fo

Chapter Thirty Two

Adrian's POVI spent Thursday thinking about where to take her.Not overthinking it — I had learned enough about Lena to know that anything that looked planned to the point of performance would land wrong. She wanted to not know where they were going. She'd said it directly and she meant it in more than one sense.Marcus found me staring at the window at four o'clock and said nothing for a full minute before he put a folder on my desk."Southeast Asia final handover documents," he said. "Chen needs your signature by end of day."I signed them without reading them because I had already read them twice. He collected the folder and was halfway out the door when I said, "You've lived in New York your whole life."He turned."If someone hasn't been here in five years and they're starting to actually be here again," I said. "Where do you take them?"He considered it. "Somewhere they haven't been before or somewhere they forgot they loved?"I thought about Rockaway. The cold sand. Her taking

Chapter Thirty Three

Lena's POVThe dinner was at a steakhouse in the West Village that I'd chosen deliberately — neutral ground, good wine list, the kind of place where nobody would feel like they were on anyone's territory.Ethan arrived first. He was standing at the bar when I walked in, already in conversation with the bartender, because Ethan had never once in his life stood quietly in a room when there was a person available to talk to.He hugged me and looked past my shoulder."He's not here yet.""He's not late yet either." I sat on the stool beside him. "Stop watching the door.""I'm not nervous.""You're watching the door."He ordered me a drink without asking because he knew what I drank and handed it over. "This is strange.""I know.""Is it strange for you?""A little." I turned the glass. "It'll be less strange in twenty minutes."Adrian came in at seven exactly. He spotted us at the bar, crossed the room without hesitation, and shook Ethan's hand in the straightforward way of two people who

Chapter Thirty four

Adrian's POVI stood on the pavement for longer than I needed to.Then I went upstairs and called Marcus, not because I had anything to tell him but because I needed to do something with my hands and calling Marcus was productive.He picked up on the second ring. "How was dinner?""Good."A pause. "That's it?""That's it." I set my keys on the counter. "The Singapore documentation — did Chen confirm receipt from the incoming team?""Adrian.""Yes or no.""Yes. Confirmed at six." Another pause. "You're not going to tell me anything.""There's nothing to tell." I looked at the window. "Goodnight, Marcus."I hung up.I didn't sleep well. Not badly — just with the particular alertness of someone whose mind had decided sleep was optional. I lay there and thought about nothing specific and everything adjacent to it and by six I gave up and made coffee and sat at the kitchen island where she had sat two weeks ago and ate pasta and talked about surgical rosters like it was the most natural th

Chapter Thirty Five

Lena's POVThursday dinner became Friday breakfast became Saturday morning at the farmers market in Fort Greene because Adrian had looked up what was near Ethan's new apartment and suggested it before I could and I said yes before I thought about whether I was ready to be the kind of people who went to farmers markets on Saturday mornings.Apparently we were.Ethan met us there. He was already holding coffee and a paper bag of something when we arrived and he looked at us standing beside each other with the specific expression of a man who had been waiting for a particular outcome and was now choosing not to comment on it."Don't say anything," I told him."I'm not saying anything." He handed me the bag. "Cheese danish. I got one for each of us."We walked through the stalls. Adrian bought tomatoes from a woman who explained their origin in more detail than anyone needed and he listened to all of it. Ethan fell into step beside me and lowered his voice."You look different," he said.

Chapter Thirty six

Adrian's POV"She said yes," Ethan said. "Cara called me twenty minutes ago. Saturday at ten. The café on Smith Street near my apartment."I set my coffee down. "Does Lena know yet?""She's the one who texted Cara this morning." He paused. "She didn't tell you.""She makes her own decisions on her own timeline. That's how it works."A beat of silence on his end. "You've gotten good at that.""I'm learning." I looked at the window. "How does Cara sound?""Terrified. Which is correct." He exhaled. "I'll be two blocks away. Lena told me to stay out of it and I will, but I'm staying two blocks away.""Good call."We talked for ten more minutes about the apartment — a shelf he couldn't level, a neighbor who played guitar at reasonable hours but still — and when I hung up I sat for a moment before I called Lena.She picked up on the third ring."You know," she said."Ethan called.""He was going to." She was walking somewhere — I could hear the city behind her. "I decided this morning. I te

Chapter Thirty seven

Lena's POVThe courtroom smelled like carpet cleaner and old wood and the particular anxiety of people who had too much to lose.I sat in the gallery because nobody had subpoenaed me yet, and I intended to keep it that way for as long as possible. Vivian's documentation had done most of the work. The DA's office hadn't needed my testimony to make the arrest. Whether they'd need it for the conviction was a question my lawyer had told me to stop thinking about until she told me to start.I was not good at that.Richard Cole sat at the defense table in a charcoal suit that probably cost more than most people's monthly rent. He looked smaller than I remembered. Not diminished exactly — just reduced. The kind of man who had always relied on the room to magnify him, and this room was not cooperating.His attorney was speaking. I wasn't listening. I was watching Richard's hands, folded on the table in front of him, completely still. The hands of a man who had spent decades making decisions t

Chapter Thirty Eight

Adrian's POVThe trial entered its third week on a Monday and by Wednesday the prosecution had finished presenting the medical evidence.Three years of records. Dosage logs, prescription histories, toxicology reports. Dr. Mercer's testimony had run four days and the defense had not dented it meaningfully. The numbers were the numbers.I watched from the second row with Marcus on my left and my attorney on my right and I kept my face neutral the way I kept it neutral in boardrooms. My father sat at the defense table thirty feet away and had not looked at me once in three weeks. I had stopped expecting him to.Lena was in court on Thursday.Not as a witness — her deposition had been submitted in July and the prosecution had chosen not to call her in person. She came because Dana had told her Cara's live testimony was scheduled for Thursday and she wanted to be there.She sat two rows behind me. I knew before I saw her — something in the room shifted when she arrived, the same way it alw

Chapter Thirty Nine

Lena's POVThe verdict came on a Tuesday.Dana had called the night before to say the jury had been deliberating for two days and had requested one exhibit — the dosage progression chart. That was specific enough to tell her something. She said be available tomorrow morning and I said I would be and I went to bed and slept six hours, which surprised me.I was in surgery when the call came.A mitral valve repair that had been scheduled for three weeks and could not be moved. I was two hours in when the jury went out and four hours in when they came back and I was closing when my phone lit up on the surgical tray with Dana's name and the scrub nurse looked at me and I said finish the count and kept working.I read her message in the scrub room.Guilty. All counts. Attempted murder, fraud, criminal conspiracy. Sentencing in six weeks.I stood there for a moment.Then I washed my hands and went to check on my patient.Adrian called at noon. I was in my office eating the sandwich I had not

Chapter Forty

Adrian's POVThe sentencing was scheduled for a Friday in November.Six weeks had moved the way consequential time always moved — quickly in the living of it, slowly in the anticipating. The Cole Industries Q3 report had gone out, the Southeast Asia transition had completed its first full quarter under new leadership, and the civil case against Richard was tracking toward a spring trial date that Dana described as solid.Marcus came in Thursday morning with the sentencing brief."Prosecution is pushing for fourteen years," he said. "Defense is arguing seven on account of age and health.""He's sixty-two and healthy enough to have poisoned me for three years.""The defense will argue diminished judgment. My sources say the judge is not receptive." He paused. "My attorney says be prepared for the higher end.""I am."He left the brief on the desk and closed the door.I read it twice. Then I called Diana.She picked up on the second ring. She had been at the courthouse every day of the t

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