His innocent wife is a dangerous hacker.-Chapter 649 Despair

"Long time no see."

The voice came from the shadows, deep and ruthless, cutting through the damp silence of the basement like a blade.

Alexa’s head lifted slowly. Her face was swollen, her lip split, her hair matted with blood that had dried hours ago. The chains around her wrists clinked as she moved, metal against metal, the only sound in the room besides her ragged breathing. One eye was nearly swollen shut, but the other burned with a hatred that no amount of beating could extinguish.

And there he was. Leonardo Moretti. Standing in the dim light, his hands in his pockets, his posture relaxed, like he had all the time in the world. Like she was already nothing.

Her eyes flashed with hatred. "Go away," she spat. "You bastard."

Leo didn’t move. Didn’t blink. Just watched her with those cold gray eyes, the same eyes she had been trying to catch for as long as she could remember. The same eyes that had always looked through her like she was glass.

"I loved you." Her voice cracked, splintering at the edges. "I thought you were my friend. My best friend. And you—" She pulled at the chains, the metal biting into her wrists, drawing fresh blood that mixed with the old. "You’re going to kill me. Just like that. After everything. Don’t you have even a pang of pity? We were best friends, Leo. I knew you before her..."

Leo’s expression didn’t change. He looked at her like she was a bug pinned to a board. Interesting, maybe. But not worthy of feeling.

He glanced to the corner of the room, where a woman stood waiting. She was plain-faced, sturdy, the kind of woman who didn’t ask questions. The kind of woman who had seen things in this basement that would haunt ordinary people for the rest of their lives, but for her, it was just Tuesday. She had been handing out the punishments, carrying out the orders, keeping the machine running for days now.

She smiled at him, a small, tight thing, and he nodded once.

"Go collect your reward," he said.

The woman left without a word. Her footsteps echoed on the concrete stairs, then faded. The door closed behind her with a heavy thud that seemed to seal the room shut.

Alexa stared at the empty space where she’d been. The silence pressed in on her, thick and suffocating. Then her eyes snapped back to Leo, burning with whatever scraps of fury she had left.

"You think this is over?" Her voice was low, shaking with rage, with fear, with something that might have been desperation. "Once Archer finds out what you’ve done to me, he won’t let it go. He has connections. Government connections. He’ll crush you. Do you think just because you’re mafia you can do anything? You can’t touch him. He’ll find me. He’ll save me, and then—"

Leo turned away from her.

It was the most dismissive gesture she had ever seen. The kind of movement that said she wasn’t worth his attention. Wasn’t worth his anger. Wasn’t worth anything at all.

He moved to a small table in the corner, where a projector sat waiting. His movements were slow, like he had all the time in the world. Like he was savoring this. Alexa’s words died in her throat as she watched him, her breath catching, her heart pounding against her ribs.

"What are you doing?" she whispered.

He didn’t answer. He pressed a button, and the projector whirred to life.

The wall in front of her flickered, colors bleeding into focus, and then Alexa’s breath stopped.

It was her living room. Her house. The house she had decorated by ordering the maid around with the finest luxury, the house where she had sat and dreamed of Leo while her husband slept beside her.

And there, on the floor, was a woman who looked exactly like her.

The same hair. The same face. The same build. She was sitting cross-legged on the rug, her hair loose around her shoulders, wearing a soft pink dress that fell to her knees. She was laughing at something—something the baby was doing, maybe—because there he was, little Adrian, his tiny hands reaching for her face, his mouth open in a gummy smile that showed no teeth yet.

And Archer. Archer was there too, sitting on the couch behind them, watching his wife and son with an expression Alexa had never seen on his face. Soft. Warm. Content. The way he used to look at her before he grew irritated with her. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

The woman reached for the baby, lifted him into her arms, and pressed a kiss to his forehead. Adrian giggled, grabbing at her hair, and she laughed, a sound that seemed to fill the room with light. Archer watched her with something complicated in his eyes.

"Archer doesn’t know you’re here. You’ve already been replaced."

Leo walked to the projector, standing beside it, watching the image on the wall. His hands were in his pockets again, his shoulders relaxed, his head tilted slightly, like he was watching a particularly interesting documentary.

"She looks a lot like you, doesn’t she? The hair, the face, the shape of her eyes." He tilted his head, studying the image. "I found her in a place like this, actually. A cold basement." He glanced at Alexa, his eyes sharp. "She was grateful to be free. Grateful to have a life. Grateful to have a baby to love. She doesn’t care that he isn’t hers. She loves him like he is. That’s more than you ever did."

Alexa shook her head, the chains rattling, the sound frantic and desperate. "No. No. Archer knows. He has to know. He loves me. He would never—he wouldn’t just let some stranger—"

Leo chuckled. The sound was low, dark, utterly without humor. It echoed off the concrete walls, filling the space between them like smoke.

"Impossible," she whispered, her voice breaking. "Impossible. He loves me. He loves me."

"Does he?" Leo walked closer to her, his shoes silent on the concrete floor. Each step was measured, unhurried, the step of a man who had already won. "Or does he love the woman who gave him a son? The woman who smiles at him, who holds his hand, who wears pretty dresses and laughs at his jokes? Because she does all of that. And she does it better than you ever did."

He stopped in front of her, close enough that she could see the cold amusement in his eyes, the way his lips curved just slightly at the corners. He didn’t know much about what was happening between Archer and the imposter he had sent. Didn’t care to know. But watching Alexa’s face crumple, watching the hope drain out of her eyes, was worth more than any report.