Too Late for Sorry, Mr. Billionaire (Chasing my Wife Back) novel Chapter 134

THE house was quiet at night, but she still wasn't able to sleep. Both boys were asleep, Hazel's light was off, and the city outside had settled into its low nighttime hum. Amelia sat at the kitchen table in her robe with a cup of tea she had made twenty minutes ago and hadn't touched, staring at nothing in particular.

She had come home from work early, kissed the boys when they came back from school, sat through homework supervision with Gaddiel, listened to Gabriel tell a very long story about something that happened at break time, and did all of it with the careful, present attention she always gave them. Because they didn't understand why her presence felt heavy around them today. They were seven years old and they needed their mother present, not a haunted and broken woman.

But now they were asleep, and the house was quiet, and there was nothing left to focus on except the thing she had been pushing to the edges of her mind all day.

Vivian.

She picked up the tea, took a sip, and set it back down. When she couldn't stay in the kitchen again, she made her way towards her bedroom. The knock on her bedroom door came softly around nine-thirty. She looked up, slightly startled.

"Mom?" Hazel's voice came through the wood.

"Come in, sweetheart." She answered softly and began to sit up.

Hazel pushed the door open and leaned against the frame, still in her school hoodie. She hadn't taken it off to wear her nightwear. She looked at her mother sitting on the bed alone in the half-dark with the untouched tea.

"Are you okay? You seemed kind of distant today. Is everything okay?" she asked as she made her way towards her mother's bed.

"Come sit with me," Amelia said instead of answering.

Hazel came, climbed into the bed and sat down. She didn't push immediately. She just looked at her mother the way Amelia had looked at her countless times— with patience, waiting for whatever needed to come out to find its own way.

"Uncle Valentine brought his girlfriend to meet me Saturday," Amelia said finally.

Hazel nodded slowly.

"I know. You told me he was planning to."

"Did he tell you anything about her?"

"Just that she was really special, and he loved her so much." Something twisted in Amelia's heart as she heard the word 'love'. She knew it. She knew that Vale loved Vivian, and could literally see it in his eyes that evening. Hazel tilted her head slightly. "Why? What happened?"

Amelia wrapped both hands around the mug.

"The girl he brought," she said carefully, "is someone from my past. Our past... This family's past. Someone connected to a very painful time of our life."

Hazel was quiet for a moment.

"Connected in what way?"

Amelia looked at her daughter— this fifteen-year-old who had already seen more of life's complications than most adults, who had sat across from her on countless difficult nights and handled the truth better than most people twice her age. She deserved honesty.

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