After I Stopped Loving Him (Isabella and Ethan) novel Chapter 1009

It didn’t even matter if Natalie was the real reason Isabella died. Just the fact that she’d pushed Cynthia down the stairs was enough for them to lock her up.

Stephanie never imagined Natalie could be so ruthless, not even able to get along with Cynthia.

After Cynthia married into the Lane family, she always treated Jordan better than her own daughter. Stephanie could understand Cynthia’s thinking. Being a stepmother wasn’t easy. Cynthia had done it so her daughter, Isabella, could grow up safe with the Lane family protecting her. Loving your stepchild more than your own hurts more than anything, but Cynthia felt like she didn’t have a choice.

When Jordan got married, Cynthia treated Natalie well, too. Natalie and Jordan had been close since they were kids, and Cynthia had watched her grow up. No one expected Natalie to call her “mom,” but she was still her elder. Even after Isabella fought with Natalie nonstop for three years and caused all kinds of chaos, even upsetting the Adams family, Cynthia never showed favoritism. As a stepmother, she was fair. As a mother to Isabella, she clearly fell short.

It wasn’t that Cynthia didn’t love Isabella. She was her only child. Losing Isabella would’ve devastated Cynthia. There was no reason for Natalie to be so cold to her.

In the end, Natalie was just too heartless, too poisonous.

But Ethan, Cynthia’s grandson, wasn’t blameless either.

If Ethan hadn’t kept being so good to Natalie after getting married, Isabella wouldn’t have gotten so jealous. She wouldn’t have stirred up so much trouble or made everyone hate her. Honestly, the biggest mistake was Ethan’s.

Sophia, listening nearby, felt her mind spinning as Grandma called the police. She heard those words—Cynthia hadn’t killed herself. Grandma said Cynthia was pushed, there was proof, and the person who did it was Natalie.

Cynthia... didn’t take her own life?

After hanging up, Stephanie grabbed Sophia and called Jeremy and Frank. The four of them hurried to the Lane house.

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Meanwhile, at the Lane residence, Natalie was just waking up.

Jackson, still mourning his wife, had said he needed to go travel and clear his head. He wasn’t home.

Now that the bothersome Cynthia was gone, the house felt emptier than ever.

Natalie remembered what her mother told her, to hurry up and have a baby. It was strange, though. Both she and Jordan were perfectly healthy, but in over four years of marriage, she’d only been pregnant once. That baby was something they both wanted so badly... but in the end...

The pregnancy didn’t make it. She’d started a big argument with Isabella on the stairs and then threw herself down on purpose. Jordan and Ethan only saw Isabella standing there looking shocked. In their eyes, Isabella had pushed her.

Of course, they lost the baby, and Isabella took all the blame for the miscarriage.

Natalie had taken care of herself, hoping for another chance to have a child. But since then, nothing. Not a single whisper of news.