Home / Romance / THE WIFE HE THREW AWAY: My ex-husband's regret / Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

All Chapters of THE WIFE HE THREW AWAY: My ex-husband's regret : Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

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{ YOU HAVE TO BE SMART, KARL }

KARL The coffee on my desk had gone cold an hour ago. I hadn't touched it since my assistant set it down, the brown liquid sitting still beneath the bright office lights. I stood by the grand glass windows, my hands shoved deep into my pockets as I looked out at the morning traffic on the boulevard below. My tie was already loose at my throat, my collar unbuttoned, the pressure of the board's ultimatum sitting like a physical weight behind my ribs. My assistant knocked once and stepped halfway through the door, holding a gold card in her hand. "Mr. Hawthorne, the Sovereign Apex Prize committee sent an invitation for the grand finale. Four days from now. They'd like confirmation by end of day." "Accept it," I said, not looking up from the glass window. "I'll handle it," she said, closing the door behind her. I barely registered the word

{ WHAT I HAVE TO BEAR }

LEILAThe clerk's eyes dropped to her screen, then back up, careful and rehearsed. "I'm not able to say more than that, Ms. Stonne. I'm sorry. It's a decision from management, not something I have the authority to explain."I stood there a moment longer, waiting for something more, some explanation that would make sense of any of it. Nothing came. The lobby behind her was quiet, the carpet clean, the white walls throwing back the harsh morning light. I didn't have the strength left to push. I picked up my bags, turned toward the exit, and walked back out into the gray morning light. The next place I tried didn't even let me finish giving my name before the answer came back the same way. The woman at the counter gave me a small shake of her head, her smile tight. No explanation. No room available.A third stop, further out, gave me the same quiet refusal, delivered with the same careful, rehearsed discomfort I was starting to recognize. The man behind the desk wouldn't meet my eyes a

{ LEILA STONNE IS NO LONGER HERE }

GEORGE The call came in just after nine. I stood behind my black desk, looking out at the morning sun hitting the glass towers across the street, the phone heavy against my palm. "He's improving, Sir," the attending physician said, his voice coming through the line clear and steady. "Still critical, but stable in a way he wasn't a month ago. I think a video call would do him good, if you're able." "Set it up," I said, my voice dropping. "Now, if you can." I sat down, my eyes fixed on the blank monitor as the system processed the secure link to the hospital in New Delhi. A few minutes later, Theodore's face filled the screen, thinner than I remembered, lines worn deep into his skin, with medical tubes running along his left arm. But his eyes found the camera lens and held there, steady and clear. "George," he said, his voice thin but present through the speaker.

{ I CAN NOT LET THIS DAY PASS }

LEILA The email arrived just after breakfast, a formal request from the Sovereign Apex Prize committee to confirm my attendance at the grand finale. The text was short, asking for a final verification before they locked the presenter list for the evening panels. I typed my reply in under a minute, my fingers heavy against the keyboard. Confirmed. Three days remained. George's name lit up my phone more times than I could count over those three days, calls followed by text messages I didn't open. Doreen called twice, then stopped trying. I let all of it go unanswered, the phone face down on the small table near the bed. I didn't have room for either of them right now, and I couldn't risk the distraction of their voices breaking through the walls. The constant vibration against the wood table became a background hum to my panic. ...

{ WAITING FOR AN ANSWER THAT'S NOT COMING }

GEORGE I was dressed and out the door earlier than I needed to be, the drive to the venue quiet as I guided the car through the clear morning traffic. The sun was just rising over the city lines, but my mind was circling back to her more than once despite everything else waiting for me that day. I had spent the last forty-eight hours checking the design workstations and tracking her inactive profile on her social networks. I parked the car in the lower garage and took the elevator up to the main lobby. The glass doors opened into a wide hall where my lead assistant, Harris, was already waiting by the registration benches with a folder under his arm. He stepped into my space the moment my boots hit the tile, his face serious. "The investor tier is completely locked, Sir," Harris said, walking beside me as we moved toward the main entrance. "The trustees from the

{ ECHOES OF HER PRESENCE }

KARL I was announced as I walked into the grand hall, greeting a few business leaders I had met during past quarterly reviews, and immediately spotted George standing near the front of the room. I took a seat on the opposite side of the VIP tier without acknowledging his presence. The presentations were already under way, the white track lights cutting across the main display screen as an engineer from the city took his seat. The director next to me, Marcus Aldridge, leaned closer to my shoulder, his voice a low hum against the noise of the room. "Mr. Hawthorne, if the municipal bond clears the senate floor on Friday, the Hawthorne Group will hold the exclusive underwriting block. Our logistics division will benefit greatly from the entire transit corridor expansion before the second quarter even opens." I sat back against the cushion, my hand resting flat on the armrest. "The numbers are alrea

{ I AM HERE }

LEILA I wasn't thinking clearly by the time I got into the car. My hands were shaking, my head throbbing in time with my pulse, but none of it mattered enough to slow me down. Two years. I'd given two years of my life to this contest. The first time I'd tried to enter this same contest, Karl had said no, and I'd let it go without a fight, because back then I hadn't wanted the prize for myself. I'd wanted my name loud enough that he'd finally see me, love me the way I'd spent two years hoping he might. That hope had died the moment I told him what I wanted and watched him refuse me without a second thought. He had dismissed my talent as a minor hobby, a distraction from the role of the quiet wife he expected me to play in his shadow. I had accepted his verdict back then because I valued his approval more than my own identity. But I am n

{ SHE'D NEVER NEEDED ME }

KARL She stepped up to the podium, her laptop balanced against one arm, her papers trembling slightly in her other hand. For a moment I thought she might not manage a single word, her pale lips parted as she gripped the edges of the podium rails to steady her frame. The white lights from the track grid beat down on her damp hair, casting a sharp shadow behind her against the gold backdrop of the stage. She looked smaller up there than she had in the boardroom photos circulating all week, smaller than she'd looked standing across from me in my own dining room months ago. For a second I almost expected someone to step in and stop this, to tell her she wasn't well enough to be standing under those lights at all. No one did. "This museum isn't meant to hold the past behind," she said, her voice thin but steady as she went. "It's meant t

{ LEILA IS PREGNANT }

GEORGE I saw her hands shake first. It lasted less than a second, a fine tremor running through her fingers as she reached for the next slide, gone almost as soon as I registered it. I was already half out of my seat by the time she started to fall, my body understanding what was happening before the rest of me had caught up. I don't remember crossing the room. I remember reaching her before security did, before anyone else's chair had even fully scraped back, gathering her against my chest with an ease that frightened me more than it should have. She weighed almost nothing. Her face was gray under the stadium track lights, her head falling back against my shoulder as her notebook clattered against the stage boards. Voices broke around me as I moved toward the private side doors, none of them mattering enough to slow down for.

{ HER NAME, WRITTEN IN GOLD }

KARL The image stayed with me even as the double doors swung shut behind them, George's arms wrapped so completely around her that there hadn't been an inch of space left between them, his hand pressed flat against her damp back like he'd done it a hundred times before. The tenderness in it was a visible thing that filled the open aisle. Something ugly turned over in my chest, and I didn't have a name for it. My heart was still hammering a fast pace against my ribs as I stood frozen near my chair, the sight of them cutting through my thoughts before I could even find a logical parameter to explain the friction away. "If everyone could please take their seats," the host said, his voice carrying an urgency that hadn't been there before the collapse. He stepped up to the center podium, his hands waving frantically toward the crowd.&

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