Alpha's Regret After the Divorce by Christina novel Chapter 182

Chapter 182

A chill of dread crept along my spine as I absorbed his confession. “So, you’ve been keeping a replica of my body all this time? Like some twisted keepsake?” I asked, my voice barely steady.

“No!” Rocco’s protest was immediate and earnest. “It was never meant to be a trophy. It was a failed experiment, nothing more.”

“For what purpose?” I pressed, though a part of me dreaded the answer.

He hesitated, then let out a deep sigh. “At first, it was just my way of holding onto you, to keep you close in some way. But then Lyra discovered it. She… she suggested there might be a way to complete the ritual—transfer consciousness into the body.”

The weight of his words hit me like a punch to the gut. “You were trying to bring me back to life? Using that… that thing?” I struggled to keep my voice steady.

Rocco nodded slowly, never breaking eye contact. “I was desperate, Kira. I truly believed you were gone.”

I wrapped my arms around myself, a sudden coldness creeping over me. The thought that he had kept a duplicate of my body, visited it night after night, and planned some way to resurrect me—it was more than unsettling. It felt like a violation of everything I was.

“And Lyra? What part did she play in all this?” I asked, my curiosity edged with suspicion.

A shadow crossed Rocco’s face—a flicker of darkness and dawning realization. “She said she could help perfect the ritual. I funded the Triads’ research, hoping they could find a way.”

“But?” I urged, sensing there was more he wasn’t saying.

“As time passed, I began to doubt her true intentions,” he admitted quietly.

I leaned in, eyes narrowing. “Lyra didn’t want to help you bring me back, did she?”

After a long pause, Rocco shook his head. “No. She wanted the ritual for herself.”

“To put herself inside that body?” The words felt foreign and chilling as I spoke them aloud. “She wanted to become me?”

As the night deepened, exhaustion overwhelmed me. My ankle throbbed relentlessly, a painful reminder of the day’s events, and the emotional strain left me utterly drained.

“You should get some rest,” Rocco finally said, noticing my weariness. “Tomorrow, you can decide what you want to do.”

I nodded stiffly, too tired to argue. He guided me toward a guest room, but I stopped him. “No. I want to stay in our— the old room.”

For a moment, a flicker of hope appeared in his eyes before he quickly masked it. “Of course.”

Alone in the bedroom we once shared, the atmosphere felt suspended in time. Everything was just as I remembered, as if Rocco had preserved this space with the same obsessive care he’d given to that body in the basement.

Out of habit, I opened the drawer of my bedside table—and froze. Inside lay an envelope, my name scrawled in Rocco’s handwriting. The seal was still intact.

My fingers trembled as I lifted it—a letter written to a woman he thought was dead, never meant to be read by me.