Lahat ng Kabanata ng Forbidden: My Alpha Brother’s Obsession : Kabanata 51 - Kabanata 60

CASSIEThe plate has gone cold again. I sit alone at the dining table with the kitchen lights on low, staring at the food I finished cooking almost two hours ago. The second place setting is still perfectly arranged for a man who might not come.Fork. Knife. Glass of water that no longer has ice.I told myself I would stop doing this. Stop cooking full meals and stop waiting up, but today makes it a year since we got married. Part of me hopes tonight will be different.That the door will open earlier. That Austin will walk in and look at me like I’m more than a required presence in his house.The clock on the wall moves past ten. Then ten-thirty. Eleven.When the front door finally unlocks, I don’t get up. I stay in the chair and listen to him set his keys down, the quiet sound of hi

CASSIEWhen morning comes, Austin is already gone. The only sign he was there is the faint dent in the pillow and the scent of his cologne that clings to the sheets. I sit on the bed for a long time with my hands pressed between my knees, staring at the wall. I don’t know what to do with myself.For a year, I’d been silly enough to think we could make it work. With the truth now out in the open, I don’t know how I’ll survive this for another six years. Emilia is married to Jace.She might be a human, but their love has grown stronger through the years. I can’t burden her with my marriage woes, especially when she never liked the arrangement from the start.Elaris is silent inside me. I don’t bother reaching for her because the response will be the same. The same distant, weakened presence that has been there for months. She has no comfort to of

CASSIEI wake up to the low, steady beep of a monitor and the sterile smell of a hospital room. My body feels wrong and heavy, like it has been scraped hollow. Seconds pass, but I only stare at the ceiling and try to understand the strange emptiness sitting in the center of my chest. It’s not just pain. It’s absence.Something that should be there is not.Blinking slowly, I turn my head. Austin is in the chair beside the bed. He rests his elbows on his knees and clasps his hands, his eyes fixed on the floor. He looks up the moment I move.“Hey.” His voice is rough. “You’re awake.”I try to speak, but my throat is dry. He reaches for the cup of water on the side table and helps me drink. After the cold weeks between us, the simple care is almost unfamiliar.

CASSIETwo days later, I wake up feeling stronger than I have since the accident. The hollow ache is still present, but the worst of the physical exhaustion has lifted. I reach for Elaris out of habit and meet the same blank silence. The absence no longer shocks me. It simply sits there, cold and permanent.Within these two days, Austin has been more present and attentive than in the last year of our marriage. It’s more than I expected. But I suspect his kindness is fueled by guilt.When work pulls him away, Nora is always nearby to help me. She adjusts pillows behind my back and offers water, quietly anticipating needs I haven’t yet voiced. It’s almost suffocating. So when I wake up this morning without her in the room to ask if I need help or feel pain anywhere, I relax.The bathroom door opens, and Austin steps into our room.

CASSIEI’m curled on a sofa in the living room with my phone, scrolling through social media posts without really reading the content. It’s late, and Austin isn’t back yet. Unlike the early days of our marriage, his absence doesn’t bother me.Seconds later, the front door opens. The familiar sound of his keys hitting the small dish startles me a little. I look up.“Welcome,” I say.He pauses just inside the doorway, his eyes wide in shock, surprised to see me here. One hand hides behind his back.As curious as I am, I don’t ask questions. But the posture is almost boyish, uncertain, as if he hasn’t decided how to cross the space between us. The silence stretches a beat too long.“Nora made dinner,” I offer, because I don’t know wh