I Was His Wife, Then His Widow, Then No One's But My Own novel Chapter 376

Xander paused for a split second before a low, intoxicating chuckle vibrated through the speaker, sending a shiver straight down her spine. "Nora."

Nora blinked, utterly caught off guard by the sudden use of her name. "Yeah?"

Xander's amusement deepened into a soft drawl. "If you keep worrying about me like this, I might just start taking it seriously."

Nora's heart slammed violently against her ribs, a fierce heat rushing up her neck. She desperately bit the inside of her cheek, fighting to keep her voice perfectly neutral. "It's common courtesy to check in on a business partner's health. Don't read into it."

Xander repeated the phrase, his tone dripping with dark, mocking irony. "Business partner."

Nora's grip on the phone tightened until her knuckles turned white. A terrifying, irrational part of her was holding its breath, desperately waiting to see what he would say next.

But the man's voice merely softened into an indecipherable, velvety hum over the line. "Well then, business partner, I'm heading home. Get some sleep."

Nora pressed her lips together in a tight line. Did she just piss him off? She agonized over the interaction for a second before concluding that Xander wasn't petty enough to hold a grudge over banter.

"Okay. Drive safe."

"Goodnight, Nora," Xander murmured.

The line clicked dead. Nora stood paralyzed on the balcony for a long time, her heart refusing to settle back into a normal rhythm. It had been an eternity since she had felt this kind of frantic, reckless flutter over a man.

She violently slapped her own cheeks, desperately trying to shock herself back to reality. She and Xander were just playing a temporary game of house. Nothing was actually changing. She needed to stop being delusional.

After aggressively lecturing herself, her racing pulse finally leveled out. She marched back into her bedroom and completely crashed, sleeping like the dead.

The next morning, Nora was violently jolted awake by the shrill scream of her ringtone. Blurry-eyed, she grabbed her phone, only to be instantly sobered by the horrifying avalanche of notifications burying her screen.

It wasn't until she pulled up to the Vance Institute that the true, terrifying scope of the internet's wrath hit her.

A massive mob of furious, self-righteous strangers had barricaded the entrance, waving their phones around on livestreams. The moment Nora stepped out, a woman lunged forward, digging into a plastic bag and hurling a handful of rotting vegetables squarely at Nora's face.

"You shameless whore! How dare you taint the concept of love! Get the hell out of here!"

Nora flinched and squeezed her eyes shut, but she didn't duck. Refusing to give them the satisfaction of a reaction, she kept her chin up and marched straight toward the double doors.

The crowd surged forward, their screams echoing off the concrete. "Look at her thick skin! I wish I had the nerve to live with zero morals!"

The second Nora shoved through the lobby doors, she saw Zelda, Xavier, and Felix Ford waiting anxiously. Zelda sprinted over, her face pale with absolute terror.

"Nora, are you okay?"