Marry Ex's Billionaire Uncle After Divorce (Aurora and Jasper) novel Chapter 267

Chapter 232: Henderson’s Project

(Author’s POV)

+25 Pants

Jasper studied her. She was sitting across from him with her coffee cup held in both hands, her gaze fixed on nothing. She looked composed on the surface. She always looked composed on the surface.

But something underneath it wasn’t right.

He thought about the project. He thought about the scope of it, the complexity, the number of moving parts that would need to be managed simultaneously. He thought about whether Sienna, in this state, was actually capable of holding any of it together.

A quiet unease settled in his chest.

He didn’t say anything more about it.

In the Everett Global offices the following morning, Arthur stopped Phineas in the corridor.

“The Henderson project,” Arthur said. “You gave that to Jasper deliberately.”

Phineas glanced at him.

“You’re setting him up to fail.”

“I’m giving him an opportunity.” Phineas straightened his cuff. “Whether he fails is entirely up to him.”

“Phineas.”

“There are people in this family who have been coasting on the Everett name for fifteen years without contributing anything of substance.” His voice was mild. “Sooner or later that becomes a liability. Better to find out now, under controlled conditions, than later when the stakes are higher.” Arthur looked at him for a long moment. Then he exhaled and shook his head.

“I’m not going to talk you out of this, am I.”

“No.”

Arthur walked away. Phineas watched him go, and his expression didn’t change.

(Aurora’s POV)

Leo was waiting near the school gate when I pulled up. He saw me through the windshield and his whole posture shifted – shoulders drawing in, eyes going to the ground, like he was trying to calculate whether he could disappear before I got out of the car.

I didn’t mention Martha. I didn’t mention the kidnapping.

Chapter 232 Henderson’s Project

“I heard you want to skip directly to senior year,” I said.

He looked up. “I already passed the placement tests. All of them. The school confirmed it.”

“When did you have time to study for all of that?”

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“I’ve been working through it since last year.” There was a stubborn set to his jaw. “I’m not behind. I just need the school to recognize it.”

I looked at him. He was thinner than I remembered, and there were shadows under his eyes that hadn’t been there before. But the defiance in his expression was entirely his own.

“Tuition and living expenses,” I said. “I’ll cover them. All of it. Whatever school you get into.”

His face changed.

“You don’t have to carry any of what’s happened,” I said. “That’s not yours to carry. Just focus on your work.”

His eyes went red at the edges. He swallowed once, hard.

“Are you sure?” His voice came out rough. “After everything she did – you really don’t-”

“I’m your sister,” I said. “That hasn’t changed. It won’t change unless you decide it does.”

“I won’t,” he said immediately. “I won’t ever.”

I smiled at him. “Then go to class.”

He turned and walked back toward the gate. At the entrance, he stopped and looked back. He raised one hand in a wave, and his voice carried clearly across the distance between us.

“Congratulations on getting married, Rory. I hope you’re happy.”

It sounded honest and a little broken at the same time.

I stood by the car and watched the gate for a while after he disappeared through it. I’d promised him money. I hadn’t promised him closeness – the kind we used to have, easy and unguarded. That was gone. Not because of him. Because of Martha, and her choices, and the wreckage she’d left behind.

I got in the car. The school gate slid past the window as I pulled away.

The travel brochures were spread across the coffee table in a neat stack.

I picked up the top one. Switzerland. Then Maldives. Then Tuscany. Each one tabbed and organized, with small handwritten notes in the margins about specific resorts and departure windows.

I looked up at Phineas.

Chapter 222 Hedefsar’s Project

“Are we actually going on a honeymoon?”

“Yes.” He didn’t look up from his phone.

“I mean – do we have to? You’re busy, and I just started at the lab, and-”

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“Every married couple has a honeymoon.” He set the phone down and looked at me. “There’s nothing to discuss.”

I didn’t have a counter-argument. I looked back down at the brochures.

The thought arrived before I could stop it. After Jasper and I got married, he was at the office by seven the next morning. I’d spent three days alone in a house that felt like a hotel lobby, until I followed him to work just to have something to do. Then I got pregnant with Rosalind, and after that there was never a right time, and then there was a divorce, and that was that. Three years of marriage and I’d never once taken a trip with my husband.

“Is the company really okay without you?” I asked.

“Arthur’s there.” Phineas leaned back in his chair. “The people who are actually busy are the employees and the executives. Not me.”

I turned another page and my eyes landed on a photograph of the Swiss Alps – white slopes, clear sky, a lone skier cutting a clean line down the mountain.

I set my finger on it.

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