Rise of the Formidable Ex-wife (Lucia and Alex) novel Chapter 46

Chapter 46

Marco sat alone in the dining room. Broken dishes lay scattered across the floor. Spilled wine pooled on the hardwood, its red sheen reflecting the dim light from the chandelier. Crystal shards glinted like jagged stars, mocking him silently.

Above him, the quiet footsteps of his children moved across the ceiling. Huddled together in Lucas’s room, they whispered, exchanged glances, and held onto each other. United in thought, if not in words. United against him. Against Margaret. Against everything this family had become.

The silence pressed down on Marco, heavy and suffocating. Margaret’s door had slammed twenty minutes ago. No sound came from upstairs. No footsteps. No voices. Only silence and the echo of chaos.

Marco picked up a shard of china, careful despite his shaking hands. It was one of the plates Lucía had chosen years ago. Delicate floral patterns, pale blue and soft pinks. She had spent weeks searching for the perfect set. Elegant, but not showy. Something that would last. Something real.

Everything Lucia touched lasted. The furniture. The carefully chosen paint. The routines that had made their house a home.

He set the shard down and rose unsteadily to his feet. His legs felt weak. His chest felt hollow. His mind spun with regret, shame, and exhaustion.

He walked through the house. The living room, where Margaret had replaced Lucia’s cozy couch with a stiff, modern sofa that invited discomfort. The kitchen, once filled with the smell of fresh bread and warm meals, now sterile, empty, cold. No lunches packed. No little notes tucked inside lunchboxes. No “good luck” messages on papers or envelopes. Nothing that felt like love.

He opened the fridge. Expensive cheese. Bottles of wine. Ready–to–eat meals. Nothing homemade. Nothing warm. Nothing that carried care. Nothing that carried heart.

Lucia had done this every day for seventeen years. Not because she wanted recognition. Not because it was convenient. Because she loved him. She loved them. She had loved them all without asking for anything in

return.

Margaret never cared. Margaret never thought about love. Margaret thought about appearances. Status. Power. Money. Control.

Marco poured himself whiskey instead, three fingers at a time. He drank slowly at first. Then faster. His hands trembled. The alcohol burned but dulled the edges of his shame.

He stumbled to his office, leaving the wreckage behind. Photographs lined the shelves, most new, framed, perfect. Margaret’s additions. Professional, posed, lifeless. In the back, pushed aside, a single photo of Lucia remained. Monica’s eighth birthday. Flour on her nose. Laughter frozen in a moment. Pure, genuine, unposed. She had been radiant in her simplicity. Beautiful without trying.

Margaret spent hours every day perfecting herself. Hair, makeup, clothes, posture. She was polished, shiny, intimidating. But it was all strategy. Performance. A mask designed to secure what she wanted. To hold him, to hold his money, to hold power.

Lucia had never needed a mask. She had been herself. She had been constant. Reliable. Loving, Real. And he had thrown her away. Publicly. Cruelly. Completely.

His hands shook as he poured more whiskey, faster now, almost sloshing the glass. The memories pressed in on him.

The parties. The dinners. The celebrations he had missed. The evenings he had skipped for work. The arguments he had chosen over her simple presence. The opportunities he had taken for granted.

While he had been chasing excitement, Margaret had been performing for him, manipulating him, calculating every word, every gesture, every glance. She had made him feel alive. Young. Desired. Important.

And all he had noticed was surface. Sparkle. Novelty. A thrill that never lasted.

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Chapter 46

While Lucia had stayed. Through everything. Through the small, boring, unglamorous routines. Through the arguments and disappointments. Through the quiet heartbreaks and compromises. She had been there. Every day. Supporting his career. Raising the children. Holding the family together.

He had destroyed her for fantasy. For performance. For the illusion of something more exciting, more polished, more impressive.

He sank into his chair. The whiskey bottle tipped dangerously, spilling onto the desk. He barely noticed. His mind was a whirlwind of shame. Regret. Anger at himself. Anger at Margaret. Anger at the choices he had made.

And then there was the pill bottle on the desk. Prescribed after the collapse of Stone Maritime. After the sleepless nights, the panic attacks, the spiraling stress.

He shook two pills into his palm. Swallowed them. Then two more. Then two more. His hand trembled. His vision blurred. The whiskey mixed with the medication, and the world softened, edges rounded, colors muted. His phone lit up in his hand. Lucia’s number. The one he had never deleted. His finger hovered over the call button.

What would he say?

I was wrong.

I’m sorry.

I want you back.

All true. All pathetic. All too late.

Because she wasn’t that woman anymore. Not his wife. Not waiting for him to realize his mistake. She had moved on. Found Alexander Kane. A man who had given her everything he had failed to.

The irony struck him with devastating clarity. He had spent his life trying to climb into Kane’s world, to impress, to matter. Kane had not only reached that level but had also claimed what Marco had discarded. Had recognized the value Marco could not see.

He thought of the gala. Of Lucia in the emerald dress. Her posture, her poise, the diamond gleaming against her throat. The calm power in her stance. The fire in her eyes. The cold disdain she had shown him without saying a word.

She had looked at him like he was nothing. Like he had always been nothing.

And he had only just realized it.

The bottle of whiskey clattered to the floor as he dropped his hands. The phone slipped from his fingers, glowing with Lucia’s name before it went dark. Connection severed. Like everything else he had destroyed. He slumped into his chair. Darkness crept in at the edges of his vision. Thoughts slowed. Heartbeat slowed. Reality blurred.

The memories of his children flickered before him. Ria’s excitement and pride at her presentation. Lucas standing for the first time against Margaret. Monica’s trembling defiance. Their faces pressed into his mind, accusing, disappointed.

He had chosen Margaret. He had chosen fantasy. He had chosen chaos over love.

And now, nothing remained.

No Lucia. No family. No home. No future. No warmth. No redemption.

Just darkness and regret.

The phone remained on the desk, screen dark, showing only the empty space where her name had been.

He wondered, in a distant corner of his mind, if he even wanted to face the consequences. If he even wanted to wake up. If he even deserved to.

The house around him was quiet, but he could still hear the echoes. Glass breaking. Wine spilling. Dishes shattering. The sound of his children fleeing upstairs. Their united voices against the woman he had chosen

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Chapter 46

over them. Against him. Against everything he had once built.

He thought of all the small things. The lunches, the notes, the cakes, the games, the school plays. The moments he had missed but she had kept. All the care he had taken for granted.

And now they were gone from his life. Not because they abandoned him, but because he had abandoned them.

The weight of it pressed down, unyielding. Immovable. Crushing.

He poured more whiskey, trying to numb it. Trying to blur it. Trying to make it stop. But no drink, no pill, no combination could erase the truth.

Lucia had been gold.

He had thrown away gold for glass. For flash. For performance. For Margaret.

Margaret.

The woman he had married thinking she was the answer. The woman he had chosen over his family, over loyalty, over love. The woman who had revealed herself tonight in a blaze of rage and cruelty.

Everything he had believed about her had been a lie. Every smile, every gesture, every compliment, every wine toast designed to manipulate, to secure, to control.

He could not stop seeing it. Could not stop feeling it. Could not stop acknowledging that he had made a mistake so massive it could never be undone.

He closed his eyes. Tried to breathe. Tried to think. Tried to reach for some fragment of hope.

But there was none.

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