Hell Hath no fury like a billionaire's Ex

Chapter 138: The Hunt for Truth

Diane’s POV

The sterile hospital corridors felt endless as Dad and I paced outside Mom’s ICU room. My hands trembled as I clutched the plastic cup of coffee that had long gone cold, the taste bitter on my tongue, though nothing could be more bitter than the reality we were facing.

Just this morning, I’d been celebrating the biggest victory of my life in that courtroom. I’d won sole custody of Dylan and Danielle, secured their future, and finally freed us from Liam’s toxic influence. But the universe, it seemed, had demanded a cruel price for that victory.

Sophie was dead. Mom was fighting for her life. And here I was, wondering if every good thing that happened to me would forever be tainted by devastating loss.

Dr. Patel emerged from Mom’s room, his expression carefully controlled in that way doctors perfect when they’re about to deliver devastating news. Dad immediately stepped forward, his face etched with desperate hope and terrible fear.

"Doctor, how is she?" Dad’s voice cracked slightly, betraying the composure he’d been trying to maintain.

Dr. Patel gestured for us to sit, but neither of us could bear to. We stood there, braced for impact.

"We were able to resuscitate your wife, Mr. Evans," he began carefully. "However, I need to prepare you both for what we’re dealing with. The stress from what happened triggered a severe hypertensive crisis, which led to a partial stroke."

The words hit me like a physical blow. "What does that mean?" I whispered, though part of me already knew.

"Given her existing blood pressure issues and previous heart attack, her body couldn’t handle the shock," Dr. Patel continued, his voice gentle but unflinchingly honest. "The stroke has affected her left side—her arm and leg have limited mobility and sensation. Her speech is also impaired, though not completely."

Dad’s face crumpled like paper, he collapsed into a nearby chair and began to sob with a rawness that shattered what was left of my heart.

"But she can recover?" he whispered through his tears. "With therapy, she can get better?"

Dr. Patel’s eyes filled with sympathy. "With intensive physical and speech therapy, yes, she can make significant improvements. But it will be a long road, and she may never fully recover her previous capabilities."

I sank into the chair beside Dad, my own tears flowing freely now. "This is my fault," I whispered. "All of this is because of me. Sophie is dead because of me. Mom is lying in there because of me."

Dad reached over and took my hand, his grip fierce despite his tears. "No, sweetheart. This is not your fault. None of this is your fault."

But I couldn’t believe him. How could I? I’d won custody of my children that morning, felt that surge of triumph and relief, and now look what it had cost.

Sophie was gone forever, and Mom—my strong, beautiful mother who’d raised us alone, who’d welcomed Dad back with such forgiveness and love—was lying in that bed, her body betraying her because of the violence that had invaded our home.

"Can I see her?" I asked Dr. Patel, wiping my eyes with tissues that Dad handed me from a nearby dispenser.

"She’s awake, but her speech is quite slurred. Don’t be alarmed if you can’t understand everything she says. With time and therapy, it will improve."

We made our way into Mom’s room, and my heart broke all over again. She was propped up in the hospital bed, the left side of her face slightly drooped, her left arm lying motionless on the blankets. But her eyes—her beautiful, strong eyes—were alert and filled with tears when she saw us.

"Di...ane," she managed, the word thick and difficult. "Ba...bies?"

"They’re safe, Mom," I said, taking her good hand in mine. "Dylan and Danielle are safe. Sophie saved them."

Tears rolled down Mom’s cheeks as she tried to speak again. "So...phie. My...baby."

Dad moved to her other side, gently stroking her hair. "I know, Helena. I know."

We sat with her for an hour, watching her struggle to form words, seeing the frustration in her eyes when we couldn’t understand what she was trying to say. It was heartbreaking, but it was hope too. She was alive. She was fighting.

"I need to get back to the children," I said finally. "They need me, and you need rest."

Mom nodded, squeezing my hand with her good one. "Love...you," she managed clearly.

"I love you too, Mom. So much."

We made our way back to Dad’s house in silence, both of us lost in our own grief and relief. When we arrived, Joan met us at the door, her face drawn with worry and exhaustion.

"How is she?" she asked immediately.

"Alive," I said, and the word felt like a small miracle. "She had a partial stroke, but the doctors think she can recover with medication and therapy."

Joan wrapped her arms around me, and I could feel some of the crushing weight lift from my chest. Mom wasn’t gone. Damaged, yes, but not gone.

Noah appeared in the doorway, Dylan in his arms. My son looked at me with those serious dark eyes, and I wondered if he could sense the tragedy that had befallen our family. I took him from Noah, holding him close, breathing in his sweet baby scent and trying to find some anchor in the storm of my grief.

"Danielle’s been fussy," Noah said quietly. "I think she knows something’s wrong. Babies are more perceptive than we think."

I nodded, following him to where Danielle lay in her portable crib. She was awake but quiet, her tiny fist curled against her cheek. When she saw me, she made a small sound—not quite a cry, but something plaintive that broke my heart all over again.

"She was with Sophie when..." I couldn’t finish. "Sophie died protecting her."

The weight of that sacrifice hit me anew. My sister, who I’d been so angry with, who’d betrayed me with Liam, had given her life to save my daughter.

"Diane," Joan said gently, "maybe you and the children should stay here with your father for a while. Until we know it’s safe."

Dad nodded immediately. "Please. I need family around me right now. And this house has better security than yours."

The thought of going back to my house—the house where Sophie had died, where there was still crime scene tape and blood on the walls—made me feel sick. I couldn’t bring Dylan and Danielle back there, not yet. Maybe not ever.

"Okay," I whispered. "We’ll stay."

That night, I barely slept. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Sophie’s face, remembered the way Mom’s hand had felt so cold in mine. I checked on the babies constantly, terrified that somehow the violence would find us here too.

---

The next morning, Dad appeared at breakfast looking haggard but determined. There was something different in his expression—a hardness I hadn’t seen before.

"I’m going back to the house," he announced. "There’s something I need to check."

"Dad, it’s still a crime scene," I protested. "The police won’t let you—"

"They’ll let me," he said with quiet certainty. "I have contacts. And there’s something the police don’t know about, something I installed when I bought you that house."

Joan looked up from her coffee, suddenly alert. "What kind of something?"

Dad’s expression was grim. "Insurance. The kind of insurance that might help us find whoever did this to our family."

He left before I could ask more questions, and I spent the morning pacing anxiously while Joan tried to keep me distracted with discussions about estate planning and legal matters that felt surreal in the wake of our tragedy.

When Dad returned several hours later, he was carrying a familiar yellow teddy bear—Dylan’s favorite from his crib.

"What’s that for?" I asked as he set up his laptop on the kitchen table.

"When I got the house for you and the babies, I wanted extra protection," Dad said, his voice tight with controlled anger. "I had a tiny camera installed in this bear. I thought it might help keep an eye on things when no one was around."

My heart started racing. "You mean it recorded everything?"

"Everything," Dad confirmed, carefully opening a small compartment in the bear’s back and removing a memory card. "The main security cameras were disabled—whoever did this knew what they were doing. But they didn’t know about this."

Joan, Noah, and I gathered around the laptop as Dad pulled up the video files. "Are you sure you want to see this?" he asked quietly. "It’s going to be brutal."

I thought about Sophie, about my need to know exactly what had happened to her, about finding justice for the sister who’d died protecting my children. "I need to see it," I said. "I need to know."

Dad nodded and clicked play.

The video was crystal clear, showing the nursery from an elevated angle. At first, everything looked normal—just the empty cribs, the rocking chair, the peaceful space I’d created for my babies.

Then a man appeared in the doorway. He was large, wearing dark clothes and a mask that obscured his features. But even disguised, there was something familiar about the way he moved.

Sophie entered the frame moments later, clearly having heard something. She was carrying Danielle in her arms, probably having just picked her up for a feeding. When she saw the intruder, she immediately moved to put herself between him and both cribs.

"Get away from them," we could hear her say on the audio, her voice shaking but determined.

The man moved toward her, and Sophie backed against the wall, still clutching Danielle. They were too far from the door—he was blocking her only escape route.

"I’m not here for the children," the man said, his voice cold. "I’m here for you, Sophie."

Sophie’s eyes widened in shock, her face going pale. "Who sent you?" she whispered, her voice barely audible on the recording.

The man remained silent, advancing toward her with deliberate steps.

"Please," Sophie begged, backing further against the wall, still protecting Danielle. "Who sent you? What do you want from me?"

But the intruder gave no answer. Instead, he lunged forward, his gloved hands reaching for her throat.

What happened next unfolded with horrible, heart-wrenching clarity. Sophie fought him with everything she had, kicking and clawing while somehow managing to keep hold of Danielle. She twisted and struggled, her free hand beating against his arms, her legs kicking desperately as his hands closed around her neck.

"Please," Sophie gasped, her voice getting weaker as he choked her. "The baby... don’t hurt the baby."

I was sobbing now, watching my sister fight for her life and for my child’s safety. Joan had her arm around me, and I could hear Noah cursing under his breath.

Sophie’s face was turning red, then purple, as she struggled to breathe. But even as the life was being squeezed from her, she never loosened her grip on Danielle. Her body was weakening, her kicks becoming feebler, but her arms remained curved protectively around my daughter.

In her final moments of consciousness, as her vision must have been fading, Sophie managed one last desperate act. With her free hand, she clawed at the man’s mask, her fingernails catching the edge and pulling it away from his face.

The camera caught him clearly—a man in his thirties with a scar along his jawline, his face twisted with rage and desperation.

I gasped, my hand flying to my mouth. "I know him! Joan, that’s the man from the café! The one who was following us!"

Joan leaned forward, studying the screen intently. "You’re right. It’s the same face from the photos you took that morning."

On the video, the man realized his face had been exposed. Sophie had seen him clearly, could identify him if she survived. Her eyes were rolling back, her body going limp, but she was still breathing—still alive.

He couldn’t risk her surviving.

Sophie’s body fell to the floor as he released her throat, and she lay there gasping, trying to crawl away while still clutching Danielle. But she was too weak, too damaged from the strangulation.

The man pulled a gun from his jacket.

"No," I whispered, but I couldn’t look away.

The gunshots were deafeningly loud through the laptop speakers. Two quick shots to Sophie’s chest. She jerked with the impact, her body convulsing, but even as the life left her eyes, her arms remained curved protectively around Danielle.

My baby girl was crying now, covered in Sophie’s blood but miraculously unharmed. Sophie had absorbed the bullets, had used her own body as a shield even in death.

But the video wasn’t finished. Dad pulled out another flash he had gotten from the cctv covering the kitchen area which the intruder must have missed.

There was Mom, moving gracefully around the kitchen, humming softly as she prepared lunch for the family. She was holding a bottle of wine, her face peaceful and happy, completely unaware of the horror unfolding upstairs.

Then came the sound of the gunshots, muffled but unmistakable.

Mom froze, the bottle of wine trembling in her hand as panic washed over her face. "Sophie?" she called out, her voice sharp with alarm.

The stress hit her immediately. Her face contorted with pain as she clutched her chest, the wine glass slipping from her hand and shattering on the kitchen floor. She staggered toward the kitchen table, gasping for breath, her face gray with the telltale signs of a cardiovascular episode.

"No," Dad whispered, watching his wife collapse. "Helena, no."

On the screen, Mom fell to the kitchen floor, her body convulsing as the hypertensive crisis took hold. But even in her distress, she tried to crawl toward the door, toward the stairs where Sophie and the babies were. She made it halfway across the kitchen before her strength gave out completely, and she lay still by the kitchen door.

That’s where Dad had found her when we arrived home—unconscious but alive, her body having betrayed her in the face of unimaginable shock.

When the video ended, we sat in stunned silence. The reality of what Sophie had endured, what she’d sacrificed to save Danielle, was almost too much to bear.

"I need to find this monster," Dad said, his voice hard as steel. "I’m calling my contact in the force."

Dad was already reaching for his phone, dialing a number from memory. "Marcus? It’s Andrew. I need your help. My daughter was murdered, and I have the killer on video."

As Dad spoke in low, urgent tones, describing the video and arranging to send the footage, I held Dylan and Danielle close, thinking about the sister who’d died for them and the mother who lay in a hospital bed, fighting to recover from the trauma that had nearly killed her.

"We’re going to get justice for Sophie," I whispered to my babies. "And for Grandma Helena. I promise you that." noveldrama

Three days later, Dad’s contact called with news.

"They found him," Dad told me, his face grim as he hung up the phone. "Jackson Torres. But Diane..."

"What?" I asked, seeing the terrible expression on his face.

"He’s dead. They found his body in an abandoned warehouse. Whoever killed him... they made sure he could never talk."

Dad’s voice was hollow as he continued. "Marcus said it was the most professional kill he’d ever seen. Torres was stripped naked, no phones, no identification. They cut off his fingers and toes so there would be no fingerprints or prints to identify him. They stabbed out his eyes and... they tortured him before they killed him."

I stared at him in shock. "But who would—"

"Someone who wanted to make sure he could never talk," Dad said. "Someone who hired him and then cleaned up loose ends."

The implications hit me like a sledgehammer. "This wasn’t random. Someone ordered Sophie’s death. Someone wanted to hurt me, to punish me."

And suddenly, I knew exactly who that someone was. Liam might be in prison, but he had connections, resources, people who owed him favors. The timing of the attack—the same day I’d won custody, hours after he’d been sentenced—couldn’t be a coincidence.

My husband might be behind bars, but his reach was longer than any of us had imagined. And now the man who could have confirmed his involvement was dead, taking the truth with him to his grave.

Justice for Sophie seemed further away than ever, and the safety I’d thought I’d won for my children felt like an illusion. How could we protect Dylan and Danielle from an enemy who could strike from inside a prison cell?

The victory I’d celebrated in that courtroom felt like a lifetime ago. I’d won custody of my children, but at a cost that would haunt us forever. And somewhere, the person responsible for orchestrating it all was probably sleeping peacefully, believing he’d gotten away with the perfect revenge.

"Whatever it takes," I murmured, echoing Dad’s words from the hospital. "No matter the cost."

Because some prices were worth paying. And some debts could only be settled in blood.