Part 2: A New Name, A New Beginning
Singapore greeted me with rain.
Not the dramatic kind that belonged in movies, but the steady tropical rain that washed streets clean every afternoon.
I decided to believe it was washing my old life away too.
For the first few weeks, I barely slept.
Every unexpected phone call made my heart race.
Every black SUV reminded me of the Sterling family.
I rented a tiny serviced apartment under my maiden name—Anna Carter—and paid six months in advance using money Olivia secretly transferred from the account we had opened years before, "just in case life became ridiculous."
Turns out she had been right.
Three months later, my twins arrived eight weeks early.
The delivery wasn't easy.
After sixteen exhausting hours, I heard two tiny cries.
"A healthy baby boy."
"A healthy baby girl."
The nurses placed them beside me.
My son wrapped his tiny fingers around mine.
My daughter opened sleepy gray eyes that looked exactly like mine.
"What are their names?" the doctor asked.
I smiled through exhausted tears.
"Ethan."
"And Lily."
No Sterling.
No billionaire surname.
No family empire.
Just Ethan Carter.
Lily Carter.
Mine.
For the first time in years, I felt free.
...
Life wasn't glamorous.
During the day I worked remotely as a financial consultant.
At night I rocked two babies who never seemed to sleep at the same time.
Some months I wondered whether I had made the right decision.
Then I would remember Damian kissing another woman while I sat in a maternity clinic carrying his children.
The doubt disappeared.
...
Meanwhile...
Halfway across the world...
The Sterling family was falling apart.
The wedding that had dominated every magazine cover lasted only four months.
Savannah Sinclair filed for annulment after reporters uncovered that Damian had never finalized his first marriage.
Their ceremony had never been legally valid.
The scandal exploded.
Sterling Corporation's stock dropped almost thirty percent in two weeks.
Investors demanded answers.
The board forced Damian to resign as CEO.
I didn't know any of this.
I wasn't watching.
I had stopped searching his name months ago.
Peace was worth more than curiosity.
...
Five years passed.
Singapore became home.
Ethan loved dinosaurs.
Lily wanted to rescue every stray cat she found.
We celebrated birthdays at neighborhood parks.
We baked crooked cupcakes.
We laughed often.
One evening Ethan asked while drawing with crayons,
"Mom?"
"Yes?"
"Did I ever have a daddy?"
The question froze me.
"You do."
"Where is he?"
I looked out the apartment window.
"Very far away."
"Does he love us?"
Children always asked the hardest questions.
I kissed his forehead.
"I love you enough for all three of us."
He accepted that answer.
For now.
A month later my phone rang.
Only four people had this number.
It wasn't one of them.
"Hello?"
A familiar voice answered.
"I finally found you."
Olivia.
She sounded nervous.
"Anna..."
"What happened?"
"You need to sit down."
"I'm already sitting."
There was a long pause.
"Damian knows you're alive."
My heart stopped.
"How?"
"I don't know. But he's been looking for five years."
"I don't care."
"He isn't looking for revenge."
"I still don't care."
Another silence.
Then Olivia quietly added,
"Anna... Irene Sterling is dead."
...
Three weeks later another call came.
This one wasn't from Olivia.
It was from New York.
"Mrs... Carter?"
"Who's calling?"
"My name is Michael Hayes."
"I represent Mr. Damian Sterling."
I nearly hung up.
"He only wants five minutes."
"He already wasted five years."
Click.
I ended the call.
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I believed the story was finally over.
I couldn't have been more wrong.
