The Hidden Empress Stripping Her Secrets After Divorce novel Chapter 626

She remembered it all so clearly. Every single moment was seared into her soul.

But just minutes ago, standing outside the study, she had heard Lawrence say the words out loud. "He might be the only true bloodline of the Lancaster family."

The true bloodline. Not, "He is my son." Not, "Christian is my son."

If Christian wasn't his true bloodline... then whose son was he?

Penelope opened her eyes, fixing her hollow stare on the crystal chandelier above. The lights were off, and the cut glass caught the amber glow of the streetlamps outside, casting fragmented shards of light across the ceiling that looked just like frozen tears.

If Christian wasn't her son, then where was her baby? She had carried a child for ten agonizing months. She had labored for hours. She had been sliced open on an operating table.

Where was that child?

Her hands gripped the sheer fabric of her nightgown, her knuckles turning bone-white.

He had to be alive. He just had to be.

If Lawrence had managed to smuggle a replacement infant into her arms, that meant he had given her real baby to someone else. Where had he sent him? Who took him? Was he still alive? Was he safe? Did anyone love him?

Her eyes burned red again as fresh tears threatened to spill, but she fiercely blinked them back. A violent inferno ignited in her chest, scalding her very soul. It wasn't just anger. It was a pure, unadulterated hatred—a visceral, bone-deep loathing she had never experienced in her entire life.

Lawrence. Her husband. The man she had blindly trusted for three decades. He had planted a child inside her, stolen that child away, and replaced him with a stranger's blood. She had spent twenty-eight years pouring her soul into raising another woman's son, while her own flesh and blood was lost out there in the world. She didn't know if he was dead or alive. She didn't even know if she would ever get the chance to see his face.

Penelope closed her eyes and took a long, shuddering breath. When she opened them again, the frantic despair was gone. The chaotic devastation had vanished, replaced by an icy, absolute resolve. It was the terrifying coldness of a woman backed into a corner, with absolutely nothing left to lose.

She whispered to the empty room, her voice barely a scrape against her throat, yet carrying more weight than anything she had ever spoken.

"Lawrence, for your sake, my son better be alive. Because if he isn't..."