2025-11-20 12:32:12Cole listened. It was.
He got up quickly, heading to the pavement where he’d left it earlier.A missed call.Bella.His entire chest tightened—like something cold and heavy had slammed into him.He called her back instantly.“Cole…” Bella’s voice cracked. “I don’t know what’s happening to Mom. She isn’t at home. She’s not answering her calls. No note. No message. Nothing…”Her voice trembled, a thin wire about to snap.“You’re at home right now?” Cole asked, already striding toward the car.“Yes. I am.”“Okay. Take a deep breath and count to a hundred. I’ll get to you before you hit seventy,” Cole said, voice low and fast.Amanda was beside him before he even reached the door. “What happened?”“I think Mom isn’t at home or something,” Cole said. “You can wait for me. I need to go see my sister first.”“With the way you’re trembling, do you think you’ll be able to assure her?” Amanda
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Chapter 153
“Amanda, I have a plan, okay?” Cole started quickly. “And I promise you’re going to fall in love with the plan.”“I have never ever worked as a cleaner all my life!”“Oh, Amanda, is that the problem?” Cole walked over to her. “That’s nothing hard at all. It’s even fun. You’ll get a lot of experience.”She darted him a stare that could have killed if looks were weapons.“You’ll be able to add it to your portfolio even.”“Don’t get on my nerves, Cole. This isn’t funny,” Amanda snapped. “I might snarl at every single one of them tomorrow. Arghhh!”She suddenly screamed. “Cleaner??”She pointed at him. “How can I work as a cleaner????”Okay. That was good, Cole thought.Much better than silence.“I can’t do it!!”“You can,” Cole countered immediately.“Are you me?”Cole shook his head.“I can’t do it. I’ve never done such a lowly job all my life. Do you know who I am? I’m a celebrity, for crying out loud!” She scoffed. “What if one of my fans sees me?”“Research.”Amanda laughed—but it wa
Chapter 152
Amanda sulked around the house the moment they got back. She didn’t say a word to Cole—not in the living room, not in the kitchen when they hurriedly whipped something together for dinner. Not even a glance.They sat across from each other, eating in thick silence, when Cole heard a sound at the door. A soft thud. Then another. Scratching.He didn’t need to think twice.Billy.From the rhythm alone, he knew it was him. And immediately, his chest tightened. He was worried—genuinely worried—that the moment Amanda saw the dog, she’d completely lose it.Now when you have a dog and you have a wife, who do you prioritize in a situation like this?Obviously… not the dog. Right?But poor Billy kept hitting the door, whining softly, scratching like he’d been abandoned. If Cole didn’t open it soon, the dog might actually start sensing that something was wrong.“I have to… bring Billy in,” he said carefully, almost asking for permission.No response. Not even a shift in posture. It felt like he’
Chapter 151
Amanda almost snapped. Almost. God help her, she almost let the real Amanda jump out. Maybe don’t call the woman an old hag, but it was sitting right at the back of her throat.“I want to change, granny. If you can give me another chance—”“I said get out of my sight!” the matriarch snapped again, her eyes burning holes through Amanda like she wished she could slap her into another century.“I want to be a good granddaughter to you,” Amanda muttered, voice small but steady. “If you can give me just a little chance, I promise to be better. If you can—”A laugh echoed from the hallway.Amanda’s head lifted slowly, dread curling in her stomach. One of her uncles walked in, a smirk plastered on his face. If humiliation had a face, it looked exactly like him.Why did she listen to Cole? Why did she agree to this stupid, degrading plan?She looked at the door again.Cole hadn’t moved. He was still there.Still wat
Chapter 150
“Hey,” Cole said sharply, “we’re doing this together.”She swallowed hard. “Why can’t the matriarch just acknowledge me? After you left, things were still holding together. I worked. I built. I was the CEO of that branch—I grew it to double its worth. And she never saw any of it. The moment she heard you were in prison, she dragged me into the boardroom and demoted me. Publicly.”Cole turned slightly toward her. He didn’t interrupt.“She made me run errands like a damn clerk,” she spat. “Chasing signatures, carrying files. Embarrassing things. And after all the humiliation, she still didn’t give me back the position. It got worse.”Good, Cole thought. Let it burn. They could use this fire.“And now—now I win a collaboration and it’s still the same shit?” Her voice cracked.Cole waited until her breathing steadied. “How do you want to deal with her?”Amanda wiped her cheek. “I want to win deals. Big ones. Back-to-back. An
Chapter 149
They had been on the road for over ten minutes.Cole wasn’t speeding. In fact, he was driving slow enough to frustrate anyone.He wasn’t doing it for safety.He was giving her time. Time to open her mouth and explain what the hell she had just done.His jaw flexed every few seconds.He wasn’t shouting. But the silence was louder than any scream.Amanda felt it.The coldness in the car wasn’t the AC — it was him.She could feel it in her bones.Her fingers twisted in her lap. She swallowed.She finally forced something out, even if it sounded ridiculous.“That was… bad,” she muttered with a small laugh that didn’t reach her eyes. “I’m not even interested again.”Cole said nothing.Amanda glanced at him from the corner of her eye.His expression was unreadable — which was worse.Way worse.“Actually, I wasn’t scared of her,” she rushed. “I just had another plan and— but it didn’t work…”<
Chapter 148
“Well,” the matriarch began, trying to mask the sudden tremor in her voice, “I normally wouldn’t say this, but… if you’re truly sorry for everything you’ve done, win the collaboration, and I might consider forgiving you.”“I’m not sorry about anything I’ve done,” Amanda replied calmly. “So I’m not going forward with this.”Tyler snapped his head toward the phone, stunned.Another round of shocked glances filled the dining room.“If you refuse this, I’ll disown you from the family!” the matriarch snarled.“Alright, granny. Disown me. I’ll be waiting to see the announcement.”Then the line went dead.Tyler stared at the phone like it had turned into a bomb.What kind of courage was driving Amanda?Letting go of the collaboration — the one thing she’d always begged for — didn’t make sense.The matriarch set the phone down with cold finality.“Forget the collaboration,” she declared. “I will not keep a rebellious grandchild in my family. Especially not one carrying a child out of wedlock.
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