Alle Kapitel von MY EX-HUSBAND IS ALIVE AND WANTS ME BACK : Kapitel 31 – Kapitel 40

Alessia was still staring at Dele's findings, trying to decide who to call first, when raised voices erupted in the reception area outside her office."I don't care if she's in a meeting," a woman's voice snapped, sharp and furious. "Tell her Isabella Sinclair is here, and I am not leaving until she sees me."Alessia's assistant appeared in the doorway a beat later, wide-eyed. "Ms. Bellamy, there's a—""I heard." Alessia set down the blueprints, bracing herself. "Send her in."Isabella swept into the office before the assistant had even finished the sentence, dark hair falling loose around a face flushed with anger, designer heels striking the floor with the particular fury of a woman who had spent the entire elevator ride working herself up rather than calming down."You," Isabella said, jabbing a finger toward Alessia the second the door closed behind her. "You have some nerve.""Isabella. I wasn't expecting you.""Clearly not, since apparently no one in this family bothers expectin

Isabella stayed for nearly an hour after that, sitting cross-legged on the floor of Alessia's office while Aria proudly displayed her dentist sticker and Adrian, more slowly, more carefully, allowed himself to answer a few of his aunt's gentle questions about his favorite books. By the time she left, something in the room had shifted — not resolved, not fully mended, but softened in a way that gave Alessia a small, cautious hope she hadn't expected to feel that day.She should have known the day wasn't finished with her yet.Matteo called twice while she was driving the twins home, and when she didn't answer either time, he was waiting on her porch by the time she pulled into the driveway, arms crossed, expression thunderous."Uncle Matteo!" Aria was out of her booster seat and barreling toward him before Alessia had even fully parked, delighted by the unexpected visit. He caught her easily, hoisting her up with the practiced motion of a man who adored his niece completely, though his

Eleanor's warning stayed with Alessia for days, turning over in her mind at odd hours — during board meetings, in the quiet moments after the twins fell asleep, in the space between one thought and the next. She hadn't found a way to bring it to Nikolia yet, hadn't decided how much weight to give a suspicion built on nothing more than her mother's finely tuned instincts. She was still deciding when Sienna burst into her office the following Wednesday morning, phone already in hand."You need to see this before you hear about it from someone else."Alessia's stomach dropped, the particular dread of the last two weeks conditioning her to expect the worst before she'd even seen the screen. "What now?"Sienna turned the phone around.The photo filled the frame — Nikolia in a dark suit, unmistakable even at a slight angle, standing close to a strikingly beautiful woman in a floor-length emerald gown, her hand resting lightly on his arm, both of them caught mid-laugh at what looked like a b

Alessia called Nikolia the moment her office door closed, Vivienne's warning still ringing in her ears, and this time it was her voice that came out clipped and urgent."Come over tonight. After the twins are asleep. We need to talk."He arrived at nine, looking like a man who'd spent the drive over rehearsing an apology he wasn't sure would land. Alessia met him at the door and led him straight to the kitchen, the same room that had become, over the last three weeks, the unofficial battleground for every difficult conversation neither of them wanted to have anywhere the twins might overhear."Vivienne came to see me today," she said, before he'd even fully sat down.Nikolia went very still. "What did she say?""She said the two of you were never involved. She said the gala was about information, about people connected to Cassian." Alessia crossed her arms. "And then she told me to be careful who I trust, and walked out before I could ask what that actually meant.""I don't know what

Nikolia didn't have an answer for that. He sat with his son's words settling over him, the particular weight of being seen through so completely by someone barely five years old, and found himself unable to offer anything but the truth."You're right," he said quietly. "There's more. Some of it I still don't fully understand myself. Some of it I'm not ready to explain to you yet, not because I don't trust you, but because there are things a five-year-old shouldn't have to carry.""That's what Mama used to say too. Before she promised she wouldn't do that anymore.""She was right to promise that." Nikolia's throat tightened. "I'm trying to learn the same lesson she already has. I'm not there yet. But I'm trying."Adrian studied him for a long moment, something in his expression softening slightly, though the wariness didn't fully disappear. "Okay," he said finally, sliding down from his chair. "I'm going back to bed.""Adrian." Nikolia caught his sleeve gently. "Thank you for asking me