Alle Kapitel von My Ex-husband wants me back, but three billionaires want me : Kapitel 1 – Kapitel 9

Varena’s POV The Aurelian’s ballroom buzzed with life, all sharp light and the heavy sweetness of lilies. Photographers flitted around, dragging their heat with them, while a ridiculous ice sculpture of the Valeth Group logo slowly bled all over a silver tray, its sharp V tip drooping like it’d just given up.I clung to a champagne flute, untasted, and let my eyes drift over that melting V. Honestly, I was just trying to disappear into the glitter and the noise.“Smile,” Rykar murmured at my back, his hand gentle but fixed, just a little pressure at my waist. “Photographers, two o’clock.” I smiled. Eight years turn that into muscle memory.Table One. Place card: Mr. Rykar Valeth & Guest. All gold and elegance. Someone’s hand could’ve won an award for that calligraphy. I hovered so long, reading it, Rykar had to repeat my name, twice.“You look beautiful,” he said, but he was watching the cameras, not me. Tonight, the dress was midnight blue, my choice, from before stylists took over.

Varena's POV I can’t make myself drive home. Not tonight. I stay parked in Lysara’s guest spot, engine off, hands still trembling on my lap, the kind of shaking you feel in your bones and not just your skin. I send her one text, because honestly, I just can’t face the stairs alone right now. She doesn’t say much when she comes down. It’s late. She’s got a coat tossed over her pajamas and she just slides into the seat beside me, silent except for flicking the heater up a notch. We don’t talk. We just let the quiet grow. Eventually, tears come, and they can’t seem to stop. Lysara doesn’t try to patch anything or fill the silence, not yet. The engine’s low hum is the only thing between us and the too-big ache in my chest. Finally, don’t ask me how long later, time’s a blur, I manage to tell her what happened.Days pass. Eleven of them, if anyone’s counting. It takes that long just to settle enough to open a box, to let my energy rest somewhere more than a night or two, to stop living ou

Rykar’s POVThe reporter’s question just hung in the air, stiff and cold. I counted the seconds in my head. I always do that when rooms go quiet, old habit from watching deals die, one heartbeat at a time.Dennis Pruitt broke the silence, clapping me so hard on the shoulder I almost lost my footing. “Hell of a turnout,” he said, and suddenly people breathed again, the crowd unfreezing around us. The cameras swung somewhere else.Elara handed her hardhat and shovel off to a kid working crowd control, looked about eighteen, awkward in his volunteer lanyard. Suddenly the folding table at the edge of the gravel had a bright yellow hard hat and no owner.Varena was gone. She’d taken her own car too. That used to mean something. Hadn’t happened in years.My mother met me at the SUV. She’d always been able to catch me just as I tried to disappear. Her gloved hand on my arm, soft as old money, her voice warm but steely. “You were perfect,” she whispered.I said, “I said nothing.”She smiled.

Varena’s POVRykar grabbed my folder, a little too deliberately, like he’d just confiscated evidence. “Not here,” he murmured.He slipped past me, out of the boardroom, and I trailed behind. Priya glanced up, caught my eye, then buried herself in her keyboard as if her life depended on it. We slipped down a stretch of frosted glass, a hallway I’d never even had occasion to walk, nobody talking, the air thick with words not said. Our steps fell silent across the carpet, sharp and hollow against polished stone where the softness ran out.His office waited at the very end, behind a hulking door of dark wood, all privacy and no windows. When he closed it, the click was crisp and expensive, a sound meant to cancel everything else.Inside, I felt small for a second. The room was huge, definitely bigger than our Halloran Street place. Actually, I pictured the floorplan: you could've fit three of our old apartments here, easy, before I stopped myself. An aircraft carrier of a desk stretched b

Varena’s POV The pen in my hand felt off, too heavy, or maybe my grip was weaker today. I couldn't be sure. Across the desk, the tissue box was angled perfectly toward the guest chair, the first tissue poking up like a white flag. Someone had planned this, lined up the tissues, the folder, the flags. Even this was a sort of choreography. They’d already decided where, and how, I’d break down.Rykar hovered nearby, trying to strike the right tone. “Take your time,” he said, like he meant it. Then, more businesslike, “Bring in your notary.” Another pause. “You don’t have to do this right now. You’ve got thirty days….”“My notary’s been sitting on a bench out there since eight.” I set the pen down on the first sticky note, took a breath, and tried not to let the weight of his voice mess with my nerve. “Bring him in.”Rykar went out himself. He didn’t trust anyone else, not with this. The notary came in, looking like he’d just left a library, gray cardigan and all. He was polite, careful,