Fated To Not Just One But Three novel Chapter 658

Chapter 658: In The Next Life

Olivia’s POV

The morning air felt suffocating, heavy in my lungs like it had no right to be breathed. I had barely slept. The night had passed in a dull haze of exhaustion, the kind that numbs the body but leaves the mind screaming. When the sound of muffled crying finally reached me, it didn’t surprise me—it only confirmed the dread sitting in my chest.

I followed the sound to the boys’ room.

They were huddled together on the bed, three small bodies shaking as one. Leon had his arms wrapped tightly around Leo, while Liam pressed his face into the pillow, his sobs broken and uneven. The sight nearly dropped me to my knees.

"Mommy," Liam cried the moment he saw me. "Daddy is dying."

The words hit like a blade.

Through their tears and hiccupping breaths, they told me everything. They had seen him. Father Lennox. They said he looked like a ghost. Pale. Thin. Different. They said he looked like he was dying.

Each word tightened something around my heart, squeezing until it hurt to breathe.

Anger flared—sharp and sudden—burning through the fear.

He was supposed to let me handle the children.

He was supposed to let me protect them from this. From the machines. From the sickness. From the slow, terrifying way their father was disappearing. Instead, he had let them see him at his weakest, had branded that image into their young minds.

He had traumatized them.

I gathered them into my arms, rocking them, murmuring promises I wasn’t sure I could keep. I told them Daddy was strong. That he loved them. That everything would be okay—even as my own voice trembled.

When the nannies arrived, I handed the boys over with reluctance, brushing tears from their cheeks and kissing their foreheads.

I left the nannies to comfort the boys and marched downstairs, my anger acting as a shield against the grief. I found him in the dining room.

The sight of him nearly stopped my heart. He was sitting at the table with Levi and Louis, picking at a plate of food he clearly couldn’t taste. He was wearing a soft, knit head-warmer, and his face... it looked hollowed out, the skin stretched tight over his cheekbones like parchment.

I sat down heavily across from him. "You weren’t supposed to let the children see you like that, Lennox," I said, my voice sharper than I intended. "They are terrified."

Lennox looked up, his eyes glassy and recessed. "I’m sorry, Olivia," he whispered, the words barely reaching me. "I just... I needed to see them. I didn’t think."

I stared at him, my brow furrowing. Something was fundamentally wrong. The way he sat, the way he breathed—it was like he was a puppet being held up by invisible strings. Why was he wearing that hat?

Why did his face look so thin... so drained of life?

"Olivia," he said softly, his voice trembling as he leaned toward me. "I am so sorry. For hiding my sickness... for the lies. I hope one day you find it in your heart to forgive me."

My chest tightened.

Before I could speak, he continued, his eyes fixed on mine as if he was afraid to look away.

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