Billionaire, Let's Divorce! novel Chapter 426

AIDEN

I should have listened to Ana. I should have simply remained hidden when I followed her. I shouldn't have fought those men. I should have controlled my anger… Most importantly, that short pause, those few seconds where I stopped and told her that I was her dad, I shouldn't have. I should have hauled her right out of there to safety. If I hadn't misused those seconds, perhaps Amie would still be here. But I was so selfish, yet I claimed that I loved and cared for her.

Dennis had been right. He cared for her more than I ever would. He grew with her after all. He groomed her and watched her grow right from birth. I could never love her more than him.

There were so many things that I could and should have done differently, done better but it was too late now.

She was dead.

As I stared at the only picture I'd taken of the both of us when she was still in the hospital, It still felt so hard to believe.

It had just been barely a year since I found out that she was mine, since I could hold her and watch her laugh and smile and bug me about meeting herself and now she was gone?

I let out a mirthless laugh. How funny.

Was this how cruel death was? Wrapping its biting icy hands around those who didn't deserve it, curling itself around them until they were drained of every breath and life they've gotten in them.

I remembered the last time I saw her before her death, at her party. Her brows were furrowed so cutely, her arms folded across her chest as she glared at me. “Where's my friend?“

I hid my smile as I answered her. “She's here?“

Her brows unknitted and she blinked, her arms falling to her side. “Where?“ She glanced behind me.

“Right here,“ I insisted. Then I added, “With you.“

She frowned, looking at me like I had two heads. “What are you saying, uncle Aiden? Where's she?“

I crouched before her and pressed one of my palms to her chest. “Right here, sweetie. You are your own true friend.“

Then she looked at me like the dumbest person in the whole wide world before she hissed and stomped off.

I chuckled to myself and watched her go to Dennis and say something to him. I knew she was mad at me. I had intended to win her smile back with the doll house I had promised her when she was still in the hospital.

And just yesterday, I got a call that the huge doll house I ordered had arrived in the country. A big fat joke.

I still hadn't gotten back to them. What was I supposed to do with it now? Stuff her dead body in it?

“Maybe I could give it to my child, the ibe Sharon carried,“ was the thought that occurred to me this morning. Perhaps, it would forever keep the girl I barely knew in my heart and memory.

“Dennis,’’ I heard her voice before I even felt her hands on my arm. “Please, you can't remain here forever.“

Maybe, I can.