Marry Ex's Billionaire Uncle After Divorce (Aurora and Jasper) novel Chapter 244

(Author’s POV)

She pulled her knees to her chest and said nothing.

Richard stayed until her breathing evened out. Then he stood, squeezed her shoulder once, and left her to

herself.

Meanwhile, at the Everett estate, the evening had taken on an entirely different character.

The family had gathered for a late dinner, and Aurora sat beside Phineas at the long table while the

conversation moved around them. Serena sat across the way, and she had been looking at Aurora all

evening with an expression that sat somewhere between resentment and calculation.

Phineas noticed. He always noticed.

He set his fork down and looked at his niece. “Serena.”

Serena blinked. “What?”

“You know what.” His tone was even, but there was no softness in it. “She’s family. Act like it.”

Serena’s jaw tightened. She looked at Aurora, then back at Phineas. The silence stretched.

Arthur, seated at Phineas’s other side, cleared his throat meaningfully.

Serena looked at Aurora again. Her expression was the picture of someone swallowing something deeply

unpleasant.

“Aunt Aurora,” she said. Flat, clipped, barely audible.

Aurora kept her expression neutral. “Thank you, Serena.”

Serena said nothing else. But the calculation in her eyes sharpened slightly, and Aurora could see the moment it clicked into place for her – that Phineas wasn’t just Aurora’s husband in name. He was a wall she would have to go through to get anywhere near Aurora, and that wall had no gaps in it.

William set down his wine glass and looked down the table. “How are the wedding preparations coming

along?”

Phineas answered before Aurora could open her mouth. “Everything’s handled. I’m taking care of it

personally. Rory doesn’t need to lift a finger.”

William nodded once, apparently satisfied.

After dinner, they moved to the sitting room, and Phineas pulled up the wedding photos on the large screen–fresh from the photographer, barely edited, a first pass for the family to look through.

The room went quiet in the way rooms go quiet when something is genuinely beautiful

The photos were striking. The two of them looked like they belonged together in a way that was difficult to

< Chapter 209 Her Father’s Words

Cla

articulate – not just visually matched, but settled, like two people who had arrived somewhere after a long journey. And in every frame where Phineas looked at Aurora, there was something in his expression that he didn’t wear anywhere else. Something unhurried and unguarded.

Eleanor made a soft sound of approval. Mrs. Potts, who had wandered in from the kitchen, pressed a hand

to her chest.

Arthur leaned toward his wife and murmured something that made her smile.

Serena sat through the first dozen photos with her arms folded. By the second dozen, she had shifted in

her seat twice. By the third, she was visibly uncomfortable, the kind of discomfort that comes from

watching something you can’t argue with and can’t dismiss.

She stood abruptly.

“I’m tired,” she said to no one in particular, her jaw set. She didn’t wait for a response. She walked straight to the stairs and up to her room without looking back.

Upstairs, she shut her bedroom door, dropped onto the bed, and picked up her phone.

She called Sienna.

The line rang twice before Sienna picked up. Her voice was raw, wrecked from hours of crying.

“He actually cares about her,” Serena said without preamble. “Like, genuinely. I just sat through thirty

minutes of wedding photos and it was nauseating.”

Sienna said nothing.

“You need to come tomorrow,” Serena said. “To the estate. Bring Jasper. Look happy. Look like everything’s

fine.” Her voice sharpened. “Don’t let Aurora think she cracked anything.”

A long pause.

“Fine,” Sienna said. “I’ll be there.”

Serena hung up and stared at the ceiling.

Across the city, the Rathbone house was quiet by the time Jasper’s car pulled up to the front gate. Sebastian was waiting on the steps, arms crossed, expression hostile.

“You’ve got some nerve showing up here.”

Jasper didn’t slow down. “I’m here for my wife.”

“Your wife’s been crying for three hours because of you.”

Stefan appeared in the doorway behind Sebastian and put a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Enough.” He looked at Jasper with the calm of a man who had already done the math. “She’s upstairs. Go.”

Sebastian stepped aside, reluctantly, and Jasper went in.

Stefan watched him disappear up the staircase. Then he turned and walked back into the sitting room,

<Chapter 209 Her Father’s Words

where Richard stood by the window, his back to the room, looking out at the dark garden.

Clairo

Richard rubbed the heel of his hand against his forehead. He looked exhausted in a way that had nothing to do with the hour.

“I really just want to go sit by Margaret’s grave for a while,” he said quietly. “Talk to her about all of this.”

(Author’s POV)

Jasper knocked once and pushed the door open.

Sienna was sitting on the edge of the bed, still in her wedding dress, though the veil was gone. Her eyes were red and swollen. She looked up when he came in, and something in her expression shifted – not relief

exactly, but close to it.

He crossed the room and sat beside her. He looked at her face for a moment, then reached over and took

her hand.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “Today should have been better than this.”

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