The Unwanted Wife and Her Secret Twins (Mia and Kyle) novel Chapter 313

Chapter 313 S–T–A–YA–W–A–Y

Mia’s POV

“Don’t touch me!” The words tore from my throat.

I stared at him, this familiar stranger. “So you’re done pretending then? No more Jackson Maxwell? ”

Hairline fractures running through his composure.

“Mia-”

“Oh, don’t.” I held up my hand. “Don’t you dare! Tell me, Kyle, how exhausting was it? Maintaining that ridiculous performance day after day?”

I took a step closer, ignoring the fire shooting up my ankle, and studied his face. “Let me guess. You had to get up extra early every morning to apply whatever they use to make your skin look different. Whiter, wasn’t it? Like you’d been living under a rock for months. And the hair, God, did you actually bleach it?”

His jaw tightened, a muscle jumping beneath skin.

“Oh.” I laugh with tear. “The facial structure changes, right? What did they do, file down your cheekbones? Reshape your jaw? You look like someone took a chisel to your

face.

I leaned in closer. “And these ridiculous colored contacts. Hazel instead of brown. Did you think I

wouldn’t notice?”

The words hung in the air between us like toxic smoke, and I watched something crumble behind his altered eyes. Good. Let him feel a fraction of what he’d put me through.

“How does it feel, Kyle?” I pressed on. “How does it feel to wake up every morning and look in the mirror at a stranger?”

The tears fell onto my hands. Fuck.

Blood was still trickling down his forehead.

“At least now you don’t have to pretend anymore,” I continued,. “At least in front of me. Because I’m telling you right now, Kyle Branson–don’t you ever show your face around me again. Real or fake, I don’t want to see it. ”

He opened his mouth to speak.

“I truly, deeply, completely despise the idea of continuing to waste any time on conversations with you. You are nothing to me now. Less than nothing.”

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Kyle’s face went through series of changes. When he finally spoke, his voice was rough, scraping against his throat like sandpaper against raw wood.

“Let me take you to the hospital. Your ankle-”

“My ankle is fine. And even if it wasn’t, I’d crawl to the hospital on my hands and knees before I’d accept help from you.”

I turned to limp away, each step of pain. The brick pathway seemed to stretch endlessly before me, like a road paved with every bad decision I’d ever made regarding Kyle Branson.

“All things with Taylor is over.”

The words hit my back like stones thrown by a petulant child. I stopped walking, feeling something dark and amused bubble up in my chest. When I turned around, my smile felt like winter.

“You two can die for all I care.”

I turned away again and continued my limping journey to my car. Behind me, I could hear nothing, no sound at all except the whisper of wind through Catherine’s carefully maintained roses.

I made it to my car on pure adrenaline, my hands shaking as I fumbled with the keys. The moment I closed the driver’s door behind me, the dam I’d been holding back finally burst.

The tears came like a flash flood, violent and uncontrollable, ripping through my chest. I gripped the steering wheel with both hands and let out a sound.

“Damn you!” I slammed my palm against the steering wheel, the sharp crack echoing in the enclosed space. “Damn you, Kyle Branson! Damn you to hell!”

My vision blurred completely, hot tears streaming down my face like acid rain. I thought about Catherine’s last visit, how she’d held Alexander and Ethan with such tenderness, how she’d whispered to them about being good boys for their mama.

And I’d never seen her again. Never got to say goodbye. Never got to tell her how much her kindness had meant during those dark years of my marriage to her son.

“You took everything from me!” I pounded the steering wheel again, and again.

The worst part–the absolute worst part–was that seeing Kyle’s altered face, his ridiculous

disguise, had reminded me of something I’d spent four years trying to forget.

“Stop it,” I commanded myself through gritted teeth, wiping angrily at my face with the back of my hand. “Stop crying over him.”

But my body wasn’t listening to my brain. The tears kept coming.

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“Enough,” I whispered, pressing my forehead against the steering wheel. The leather was cool against my flushed skin, grounding me back to reality. “Enough crying.”

I forced myself to take deep, shuddering breaths, the way Dr. Matthews had taught me during those therapy sessions after my miscarriage. In through the nose, hold for four counts, out through the mouth. Repeat.

My ankle throbbed. I flipped down the sun visor and looked at my reflection in the small mirror. My eyes were red and swollen, my makeup streaked down my cheeks in dark rivulets. I looked like someone who’d been through a natural disaster.

Using tissues from the glove compartment, I cleaned my face as best I could, removing the evidence of my breakdown. I could at least look like a functional adult.

The drive to the hospital passed in a blur of traffic lights and half–formed thoughts. I thought about Catherine, about how she’d been dead for two years while I’d been wondering why she never called.

The emergency room was exactly as I remembered it–fluorescent lights that made everyone look like they were dying, plastic chairs designed by someone who’d never experienced human anatomy, and the particular cocktail of disinfectant and despair that seemed to permeate every hospital in

existence.

“Sprained ankle,” I told the triage nurse, who looked at me with the tired eyes of someone who’d seen too much and cared just enough to do her job well. “Twisted it on some uneven bricks.”

The doctor, a young woman with kind hands and tired eyes, wrapped my ankle with practiced efficiency while explaining the importance of rest, ice, and elevation.

“Try to stay off it for the next few days,” she advised, securing the elastic bandage with small metal clips. “And if the pain gets worse or if you notice any unusual swelling, come back immediately.”

I nodded, already mentally rearranging my schedule to accommodate the temporary handicap. Thomas would help with the twins, I knew. He’d probably insist on carrying me around the apartment like I was made of spun glass, which would be simultaneously sweet and mildly irritating.

The thought of Thomas brought an unexpected wave of guilt.

I shouldn’t have anything to do with Kyle anymore. He made me lose my mind.

I was just finishing the discharge paperwork when I saw this bastard again.

Kyle sat in the far corner of the waiting room, his head tilted back against the wall, eyes closed. Someone had cleaned the blood from his hair, and there was a fresh bandage covering.

I gathered my things and headed for the exit, moving carefully on my wrapped ankle. I was almost to the automatic doors when I heard footsteps behind me—uneven, like someone else was dealing with

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their own injuries.

“I told you not to show up!” I whirled around, the sudden movement sending a bolt of pain up my leg that I refused to acknowledge. “Can’t you understand me? Do I need to spell it out in smaller words? S

-T–A–YA–W–A–Y.”

Kyle stood about ten feet away. “This time I didn’t mean to,” he said quietly. “I was here first. For my head injury.”