Our Wedding Was Ruined and I Found a Husband `13

Chapter 13 

Laila’s POV 

“Where is Ava’s father?” 

The words hit me like a slap across the face. No warning, no warm–up, just Jason standing there, his green eyes locked on me the way he used to when he was trying to crack some complicated pack problem, or figure out why the quarterly reports weren’t adding up. Only this time I was the problem. 

“This has nothing to do with you, Jason.” It came out sharp, way sharper than I meant, but maybe that was the point. Like I was throwing up bricks, stacking a wall before Jason could even get close. 

And then his jaw did that thing. That twitch that always used to drive me nuts during meetings, like the tiniest movement carried a whole storm behind it. Same Jason. Same temper tucked neatly under the surface. 

“I was just asking,” he said, but the way it came out–like there was something bruised sitting under the words. 

I hitched Ava higher on my hip. She’s growing so fast it feels like she gains a pound every night, but in that moment, I needed her weight against me. Needed something solid to hold because everything else felt like sand sliding out from under my feet. 

“Well, don’t. It’s not your business.” 

The silence after that was thick. Heavy. Like the air had been sucked out of the room. 

Jason’s face went cold, that professional mask he always loved to hide behind sliding into place. He didn’t argue. Didn’t press. He just turned and walked away, shoulders stiff, like he was holding himself together with pure willpower. 

And I just stood there, heart pounding, hating the way a piece of me wanted to call him back. To tell him everything. To finally spit out the truth I’d been swallowing for six damn years. 

But Ava’s safety wasn’t a game. And the truth? The truth could break us both. 

When I finally managed to shortyly return to the office at work, the universe thought it’d be hilarious to trap me in an elevator with Jason and Brittany. Like some twisted sitcom nightmare. 

I’d spent all morning at the hospital dealing with Ava’s pre–surgery prep. Blood work, consultations, and filling out enough paperwork to destroy a small forest. 

I barely had time to grab a coffee on my way out. I definitely didn’t have time to look in the mirror, but based on the frizzy state of my hair and the baggy sweater I’d pulled from the laundry pile, I probably looked like I’d been dragged behind a car. 

Not exactly my “business armor” look. 

I was in such a distracted rush that it wasn’t until the elevator doors slid shut with a soft whoosh, that I even 

noticed who I was in there with. I tried to disappear into the corner, praying to every god I could think of that the ride would be quick. But of course, Jason’s eyes found me in the steel reflection. 

Always watching. Always analyzing. 

1/2 

Brittany leaned into him like some luxury sensory entert hat, pertare at the soy de te like the wide world was there to serve hier. 

“Isn’t that the women from the restaurant?” deyed, serye 

day wh 

skin. “The one you thought was that pathetic hewan you from all the pas 

Jason didn’t bite. He didn’t say anything at all, but bettering, my ow 

“What floor?” Brittany asked me directly, her voice dyed to take sex, VAKKIAI UPIAH 

“Fifteen,” 

“Oh, what a coincidence, Same as us.” Her smile shared, “da Raya, Impeding! the 

I didn’t answer. Let her think whatever she wanted, faster that way 

The elevator hummed upward. Very floor felt like a century. Many CAMERO finished. 

“Actually,” she said, tilting her head, “could you got we some coffee when we wyse op me with cream. Extra hot,” 

The words hit me like ice water. And suddenly I was rigjeron gán, sending in the price with te and all her friends laughing, ordering me around like I was dit vnder the maiced the fire se the phone while I was in labor–dismissive, cruel: “Nobody 

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