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Emily never imagined that Lucas would really find me.§
After Lucas promised to stay and live with her, she later learned from Sandra that I had disappeared. Not just disappeared–but vanished completely, without a trace. She found out Lucas had been searching for me tirelessly ever since.
She hated me. She hated that I had faked my death and left without warning. But what she hated even more was how quickly Lucas had discovered the truth. Why, after everything she had done to stay by his side, did he still miss me so much?
Even after I left, Lucas refused to let her move into the house that had once belonged to me.>
“There are memories of Zoe and me here. You’re not allowed to touch any of them,” he told Emily and Sandra firmly.
Sandra thought her son had gone mad–that I was still the only one in his heart. If Emily hadn’t been pregnant at the time, she would have fully believed Lucas might have left right then and there.
In a fit of frustration, Emily cleared out all my belongings from that house. She threw them away, donated them, burned what she could- anything to erase me.
But what she didn’t expect was that Lucas would quietly search for every item she discarded.}
He retrieved the things I had thrown away and cleaned them one by one. The donated items? He tracked them down and bought them back at any price. And the ones he couldn’t recover? He scoured the city to buy identical replacements.
He restored the entire house to look exactly as it had when I was still there.}
Even down to the smallest details.
Lucas sewed a few pieces of baby clothing by hand.”
At first, Emily had been touched. She thought he was finally accepting their unborn child.
But then Lucas explained, “Zoe always dreamed of having a child. She said babies who wore clothes made by their parents would be born into a life of blessings. She threw away the ones she made, so I’m making them now. When she returns, she’ll understand.”
“Moved?” Emily had scaffed bitterly to herself.
No. She felt it was pathetic.}
Lucas had betrayed me, abandoned me, and yet now he wanted to win me back with hand–stitched baby clothes and a shrine to memories?
Ridiculous.
More than once, Emily began to wonder: had she made a mistake choosing to be with this man?>
Maybe what she had loved all along wasn’t Lucas himself but Lucas when he loved me.
This version of Lucas–the man obsessed with a ghost–was nothing like the one she once admired.
Still, for the child’s sake, she chose to stay.
When their son was born, she named him Zane.
At the naming ceremony, she was nearly sick with resentment.
Lucas had the audacity to name their child after me?
She confronted him, shouting that it was too much.
Sandra tried to smooth it over. “It’s just a name,” she said lightly. “Lucas can call his son whatever he
wants.”
Emily turned to look at Sandra, eyes filled with ice. Her mother–in–law’s blind favoritism made her skin crawl.§
Sandra had been delighted when Lucas returned. He revived the company, restored the family name, and gave her the grandson she had always wanted.}
Emily had hoped that giving birth to a child would finally earn her the respect she deserved from her husband and his mother.” But things didn’t turn out that way.”
Sandra didn’t treat her with the warmth she once had. Emily began to understand–too late–what kind of life I had lived under that roof. Sandra didn’t care about the company’s financial situation. She constantly demanded money from Emily in secret, believing she had an endless source to draw from.
The more she demanded, the less Emily was willing to give. She began resisting quietly, keeping the accounts tighter.
In retaliation, Sandra complained to Lucas, accusing Emily of being cruel and stingy.
Lucas barely spared her a glance. His mind was entirely on running the company and continuing his search for me.”
His gaze when he spoke to her was hollow, distant–like she was a stranger.
“Emily,” he said flatly one evening, “you said you’d be a better wife than Zoe. Are you? Are you ready to be that woman?“}
Those words struck her harder than any slap.
The man she had clung to for over a decade had become someone she no longer recognized–and someone who clearly didn’t recognize
her either.
A few days ago, Lucas claimed he was going on a business trip. Suspicious, Emily followed him.
She hadn’t expected his destination to be me.”
She couldn’t stop the spiral of thoughts: Had Zoe reached out to Lucas? Had she told him where to find her?”
