Rise of the Formidable Ex-wife (Lucia and Alex) novel Chapter 311

11:45 Tue, Jul 21

Chapter 311

Chapter 311

Dinner had been comfortable in a way it had not always been this year.

The table was full. The food was warm. Lena had made something that turned out better than anyone, including Lena, had expected, and Lucas admitted as much quietly, the way he admitted things he’d predicted would fail. The baby became the subject of a brief return to the name argument before Ria steered them away from it by asking Monica about her next gallery showing, and Monica’s face did the thing it did when art came up, going fully present and quietly lit.

Lucia sat and listened and watched, feeling the particular good of this kind of evening, the gratitude of it settling into her the way she had been learning to let things settle since the hospital.

Her phone sat beside her plate, forgotten in her pocket instead of left in the kitchen the way she usually/managed it.

It vibrated.

Her lawyer.

She excused herself and stepped into the hallway, the warmth of the dinner fading behind her into background noise.

“What is it?” she said.

His voice carried the careful edge she recognized from calls that weren’t routine.

“I received a call earlier today from the prison, regarding Margaret Hart,” he said. “I thought you should know. She collapsed this afternoon and was taken by ambulance to St. Michael’s Hospital.”

Lucia put one hand flat against the hallway wall.

“Is she alright?”

“She’s alive,” he said. “Currently under the hospital’s care. From what I understand,/she’s been diagnosed with a serious illness. Stage four lung cancer, Mrs. Kane. Doctors have told the family treatment may extend her life, but the outlook isn’t favorable.”

The hallway went quiet.

“Thank you for telling me,” Lucia said, and ended the call.

She stood there a moment longer before returning to the table.

Alexander noticed her face the second she came through the doorway, already watching her the way he did when she’d been gone longer than the reason for leaving seemed to require.

She sat downL

He leaned in slightly. “What happened?”

She glanced at her plate, the dinner still mostly untouched, the children across from her still deep in conversation. She picked up her fork, then set it back down.

“Margaret collapsed today,” she said.

The table went still.

“She was taken to the hospital from the prison.” Lucia looked down. “Stage four lung cancer. The doctors are saying three to

four months

11:45 Tue, Jul 21

Chapter 311

Monica set down her fork, studying the tablecloth the way she did when something complicated didn’t need explaining because it was already visible on her face.

“She was changing,” Monica said. “She really was.” She looked up. “And now she’s ill.”

There was no resentment in it. Just the plain shape of something true.

Ria wrapped both hands around her water glass without drinking from it.

“I feel sorry for her,” she said, in the voice she used when she’d already thought something through. “Whatever she did, whatever she became, she had a good side. I saw it in how she spoke about all of us when she had no reason to be kind.” She looked at her mother. “Nobody should be dying alone in a prison.”

Lucas said nothing, eyes on the tablecloth, the processing visible on him now in a way it wouldn’t have been a year ago.

“I hope she gets better,” Lucia finally said. “I mean that. Whatever happened between us, whatever it cost all of us.” A pause. T hope she gets better.”

Dinner continued, quieter now, the conversation softer, everyone eating without quite the same attention they’d brought to the meal before.

Later the children drifted off to their rooms, and the house settled into its evening rhythm.

Alexander found Lucia in the sitting room, feet tucked under her on the sofa, book closed in her lap, unread, sitting the way she sat when her mind was somewhere her body wasn’t.

He sat beside her.

She didn’t speak right away, just looked at the closed book.

“She hurt me,” she finally said. “She hurt my children. She walked into my marriage and took it apart on purpose. She put a gun on Monica. She killed Marco.” Each fact came out plain, the way she said things when she needed to hear them to know what she actually believed. “All of that is true. None of it stops being true.”

Alexander waited.

“But she’s dying.” Lucia said. “And she changed. She stood in front of the whole country and took responsibility for everything, when nothing forced her to except that it was right.” She met his eyes. “She’s going to spend whatever months she has left in a cell, with people who bully her, and a cough she thought was nothing.”

Alexander watched her.

“I want to help,” Lucia said. “With the bills. The treatment. Whatever gives her more time, or a better version of the time she has.” She held his gaze. “I know exactly what she did to us. I still want to help.”

“Are ᏙᏅᏖᏗ. sure?” he asked, not as a challenge, just leaving room for her to sit with the answer.

“Yes.

He nodded.

She picked up her phone and called her assistant, the conversation brief and clear, explaining the patient, the situation, what she wanted arranged. Two questions, two answers, and the call ended.

She set the phone down. The room held its quiet around them.

Alexander studied her for a long moment, the same look she’d seen from him at her award ceremony, at the hospital, on the stairs the night she wore the green dress. No calculation in it. Just a man looking at someone he still couldn’t quite believe

was real

21

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ORO

11:46 Tue, Jul 21 0

Chapter 311

“I’ve met powerful people,” he said. “Brilliant people. Generous people. But I’ve never met anyone whose first instinct, after everything, is still mercy.”

She turned her face slightly away. “Alexander.”

“You’re carrying a pregnancy and recovering from a hospital stay,” he said. “The woman who tried to destroy your life is, dying. And your first thought is making sure she doesn’t spend her last months on a prison budget.” He shook his head slowly. “Most people get harder after what you’ve survived. Somehow you got kinder.”

Lucia looked past him toward the window, the dark garden beyond it, the quiet house around her.

“I’m just a woman who’s very tired of carrying things,” she said.

He put his arm around her. She leaned into him.

*

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