The Billionaire Ex-Wife's Return (Cynthia and Ethan) novel Chapter 259

Chapter 259

Cynthia's POV

But it wasn't Grace and Pascal.

It was just Anna.

She walked through the gates alone, her footsteps echoing in the vast emptiness of the warehouse, her arms wrapped tightly around herself like she was trying to hold herself together.

Her face was pale — even paler than yesterday — and her eyes were red and swollen, like she'd been crying for hours.

She stopped a few feet away from us, just standing there, staring.

I stared back, my heart pounding, my mind racing through possibilities.

Was this another game?

Another manipulation?

Was Grace somewhere behind her, watching, waiting to see how we'd react?

Ethan was rigid beside me, every muscle in his body tense, his breathing shallow. I could feel the suspicion radiating off him like heat. After everything — after years of Anna's calculated cruelty, her lies, her performances — trust wasn't something either of us had left to give her. And yet something about the way she was standing there, unguarded, her arms folded around herself not like a woman building walls but like a woman who had none left, made me hesitate to look away.

The silence stretched on, heavy and suffocating.

None of us spoke.

It felt like a staring competition — who would break first, who would show weakness, who would give in.

And then Anna did.

She broke.

Her face crumpled, tears spilling down her cheeks, and she let out a choked sob that echoed through the warehouse.

"I just want to apologize," Anna said, her voice trembling. "To both of you."

I blinked, certain I'd misheard.

Apologize?

Anna wanted to apologize?

"I know it doesn't mean anything now," Anna continued, her words tumbling out between sobs. "I know it doesn't fix what I've done. But I need to say it. I need you both to hear it."

She took a shaky breath.

"Cynthia," Anna said, looking directly at me. "I sabotaged your restaurant. I paid people to give you bad reviews. I hired someone to contaminate your kitchen supplies. I spread rumors about you in Paris, tried to ruin your reputation, tried to destroy everything you'd built."

Fresh tears streamed down her face.

"I did all the evil I did to you because I was angry," Anna said. "Because I blamed you for my parents' deaths. Because I thought you owed me something — a life, a husband, happiness — and you'd stolen it from me."

She wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand.

"But I was wrong," Anna whispered. "About everything. My parents weren't heroes. They were criminals. And you — you were just a child trying to help another child. You didn't owe me anything. You never did."

I stared at her, my mind struggling to process what I was hearing.

This didn't sound like manipulation.

This didn't sound like a game.

This sounded like… genuine remorse.

And I didn't know what to do with that. For years, Anna had been a fixed point in my life — the face of cruelty, the source of deliberate, targeted pain. She had been so consistent in her hatred that somewhere along the way I had stopped thinking of her as a person capable of change and started thinking of her simply as a force. Something immovable. Something that just was. Watching her stand there now, undone and trembling, was like watching a wall I'd built my whole map around suddenly not be where I'd always put it.

Anna turned to Ethan.

"And you," she said, her voice breaking completely. "Ethan, I'm so sorry. I pretended to love you. I manipulated you. I used you to get close to Walker Industries, to get what I thought I deserved."

She shook her head, disgusted with herself.

"Anna—" Ethan started.

"Don't," Anna interrupted, her voice firm. "Just — don't. Let me do this. Please."

The rope around my left wrist loosened slightly.

Then more.

Anna's fingers moved faster now, more frantically, like she was racing against time.

And then we heard it.

The sound of a car engine.

Close.

Getting closer.

Anna froze, her hands still on the ropes, her eyes going wide with fear.

We all turned toward the gates.

And we heard it again.

The crunch of tires on gravel.

The rumble of an engine cutting off.

Car doors slamming.

Footsteps.

Multiple footsteps.

Grace and Pascal were back.