The Abandoned Wife's Second Chance (Scarlett and Jasper) novel Chapter 122

< Chapter 122

Chapter 122

(Blair’s POV)

+25 Points

James and I drive in silence, the quiet in the car heavy with a guilt we both share but haven’t yet named.

The moment I round the corner onto Maple Street, my breath hitches. My foot instinctively finds the brake pedal, slowing the car to a crawl.

“James,” I whisper, the name catching in my throat.

He doesn’t ask what I mean. He is staring, too.

The house. Our house, is unrecognizable.

The warm, buttery yellow paint I chose after college is gone, scraped down to the bare, bleached wood.

The beautiful, curved wrought–iron railing Scarlett’s father meticulously installed is ripped out, replaced by sharp, modern steel.

But the real devastation is the front lawn.

The old oak tree, the one that used to anchor the tire swing and shade the porch on hot afternoons, is nothing but a stump, a fresh, raw wound in the earth. The colorful flower beds James and I tend every spring–gone, paved over with gray concrete.

It looks less like a home and more like an autopsy table. Cold. Exposed. Gutted.

I park half a block away and we walk up the street, a sense of dread thickening with every step. I try the front door out of habit. Locked.

The key still fits in the lock, though, which somehow makes everything worse. Like the universe is playing a cruel joke on us–letting us into a house that’s no longer ours.

“Blair, I don’t think we should be here,” James whispers behind me as I push open the front

door.

But I can’t stop myself. I need to see what’s left. Need to know if there’s anything of Scarlett that we can save.

The smell hits me first. Fresh paint and cleaning chemicals. The walls are stark white, not the warm cream color I chose when Scarlett was five and wanted her bedroom to match the living room.

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Chapter 122

“Oh my God.”

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+25 Points

My voice echoes in the empty space where our dining table used to sit. Where we ate birthday cakes and Christmas dinners and a thousand ordinary meals that felt extraordinary because we were family.

The beautiful original hardwood floors, the ones I’ve worried about scratching, are covered in plastic sheeting and construction debris. The wall between the living room and the kitchen, the one I use to tack up Scarlett’s finger–paintings–gone.

There’s an enormous, gaping hole where it used to be. The entire layout of the main floor is unrecognizable.

Even the built–in bookshelves where I kept Scarlett’s school photos and art projects have been torn out, leaving ugly scars in its place.

“They gutted everything,” James says, his voice hollow. “Everything.”

I walk through the rooms like a ghost, looking for some trace of the life we built here. Scarlett’s first steps in the hallway. Her height marks on the kitchen doorframe. The spot where she spilled grape juice when she was seven and we could never quite get the stain out.

All of it. Gone.

“The basement,” I say suddenly. “Maybe they didn’t touch the basement.”

But when we go downstairs, it’s been turned into some kind of media room. Big screen TV, leather furniture, mini bar. No trace of the play area we set up for Scarlett, the dollhouse James built with his own hands, the dress–up box filled with old Halloween costumes.

“Blair.” James touches my shoulder gently. “We should go.”

I pull away from him, desperate. “There has to be something. Something they missed.”

But there isn’t. Every closet, every corner, every inch of this house has been scrubbed clean of our daughter’s existence. Like she never existed.

My knees buckle. I sink onto a splintered two–by–four, the cold certainty of our failure settling deep into my bones.

“We should have stopped it,” I whisper, shame washing over me in suffocating waves. “We should have never listened to Virginia. We should have had her reclaim the house the moment we found out she sold it.”

James kneels beside me, his face drawn and pale. “I know, Blair. I know. I thought… I thought we needed to support her, to show her she matters to us more than a mere house…” He takes

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+25 Points

my hand, his grip tight, searching for absolution that neither of us can give. “We have to go to Scarlett. We have to make this right. We have to apologize and beg her forgiveness.”

“But will she even let us?” I ask, looking around at the ruins. “The house is gone. Her trust is gone. What’s left?”

“Us,” James says simply. “We’re still here. We may be lousy parents, but we’re the only ones she’s got. She has to know she’ll always be our daughter, no matter what.”

We leave the gutted shell of our home, each step heavy with shame. The drive to Sunrise Bakes is agonizing. My palms are sweating, my stomach churning. What if she refuses to see us, or chases us away?

Or worse, what if she just looks at us with that cold, dead expression she wore the last time we spoke?

We walk into the bakery, the air instantly warm and sweet with the aroma of cinnamon and yeast. The smell is comforting, familiar, yet the tension immediately coils around my chest.

Scarlett is behind the counter, focused, serious, her sleeves rolled up, her hair pulled back into a messy bun. She looks tired, but strong. A survivor, just like I expected.

The carefree girl who used to dance around our kitchen is gone, replaced by a guarded woman who watches us approach like we’re strangers.

Which, I guess, we are now.

“Blair. James.” Her voice is polite but cold. Professional. The way she might greet customers she doesn’t like but has to serve anyway.

“Scarlett.” My voice breaks on her name. “Habibti, we need to talk.”

“I’m working.”

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