chained by destiny

chapter3

A FACE HE CAN'T FORGET

Pedro had hurriedly left the country for a business meeting in France after the one-night love encounter.

He woke up to the absence of Cathryn, whom he had shared his bed with. Unfortunately, he didn’t get the time to process anything because he had to leave for a business meeting in France.

He hated his busy life, but sadly it was now a part of him.

The memory of her lingered at every quiet moment. Her face flashed in his mind at the most inconvenient times. He couldn’t shake the way she had held him close and kissed him, how it had felt so right, so immediate, as if they’d known each other forever.

But he didn’t know her, not even her name. And that gnawed at him.

“Sir Pedro?" His personal assistant, Chris, stood at the door of the suite, holding a tablet in one hand and his schedule in the other.

He blinked, pulling himself out of his thoughts.

"Yeah, what is it?"

"You’re due for the investor meeting in half an hour. Should I prepare the files?"

"Cancel it," Pedro said abruptly, turning away from the window he had been staring at for no reason.

Chris looked surprised. "Cancel? Pedro, it’s important—"

"Okay, just reschedule." His tone softened when he saw the concern on his face. "I can’t focus right now.

“I need you to do something else for me instead."

Chris raised an eyebrow, waiting for him to continue.

Pedro paced the length of the room, frustration building in his chest.

"I need you to call the hotel back home. The one I stayed on the night before I left for Paris. Get me every piece of information you can about the woman who stayed there that night. She was in my room."

Chris' expression was professional, though he could see the curiosity in his eyes.

"Do you know anything about her, sir?"

Pedro let out a low sigh, rubbing the back of his neck.

"I remember her face. She left before I woke up. I didn’t get a chance to… ask."

Chris typed something into his tablet, nodding as he absorbed his request. "I’ll see what I can find. you know hotels are strict about privacy."

I know," he said, impatience creeping into his voice. "But offer them something. I don’t care. I just need to know who she is."

Chris didn’t ask any more questions. He was used to handling difficult requests for Pedro, but this one seemed different. There was a desperation in his gaze that he couldn’t hide.

Pedro isn’t one who fantasizes over women, talk less of the one he met in a bar.

Chris couldn’t help but wonder what the problem was.

"I’ll get on it right away," he said, turning away to make a call outside.

As he left the room, Pedro sank into a chair. He knew it was crazy. Obsessing over a woman he’d met one night, someone who had vanished before morning.

But there was something about Cathryn. Beyond the physical connection, that was undeniable, sure, but it was something deeper. The way she spoke, as if there was something more beneath the surface that he hadn’t gotten a chance to understand.

The thought twisted in his chest, making it hard to breathe.

His phone buzzed, snapping him out of his reverie. It was his father.

He knew what would befall him if he picked the call. He was a hundred percent sure his father had heard of the rescheduled meeting with his French investors.

He tossed his phone as far as he could and quietly walked into the shower. He could still hear the phone ring over and over from the bathroom.

***********

St John’s hospital _2:40pm

Cathryn sat by her father’s hospital bed, the sterile smell of disinfectant thick in the air. The rhythmic beeping of the heart monitor was the only sound in the otherwise quiet room.

“He’s stable for now,” the doctor said, his expression grim. “But his heart is weak, and we can’t make any promises.”

Her father's pale face, lined with years of stress and control, looked so different and fragile now. And for the first time in her life, Cathryn was terrified of losing him.

This was my fault, she thought. If I had just signed the papers, he wouldn’t be here.

But the thought of binding herself to San Antonio felt like a prison she couldn’t survive. She hadn’t even been able to stay after the one-night stand with the stranger from the hotel. A man whose face she couldn’t even fully recall.

Cathryn closed her eyes, sinking deeper into the chair as guilt and confusion wrapped around her. If only she could forget that night, but something told her she never would.

She was jolted back to reality when her mother walked into the room with her father’s long-time secretary, Claudia. News had begun to fly around that Mr James had been hospitalized.

“This looks bad, Mrs Eleanor, the company needs him now more than ever, some of our investors are backing out of our company” her expression fraught with worry as she stood still looking at her boss.

She turned to Cathryn, “The company is in serious trouble. They’ve heard about your father’s condition, and without a guarantee that he’ll recover… they’re backing out of deals left and right.”

Cathryn swallowed hard, the weight of those words hitting her like a punch to the gut. “What are you saying? The company could”

“Fall apart,” Claudia finished, her voice tight. “Yes. If your father doesn’t recover soon, everything he built could collapse. And the investors know it.”

Cathryn’s chest tightened as she heard this. She took a glance at her stepmother who was staring blankly at the window.

She could feel her mother blamed her for everything from the sidelong glance her mother threw her way. Mrs Eleanor hadn’t said a word to her since they arrived at the hospital, but her silence spoke volumes.

The door opened again, and another group of business associates entered the waiting room. They offered curt nods and whispered condolences before disappearing into the ICU. The parade of faces never seemed to end, all of them carrying the weight of the company’s downfall on their shoulders, silently expecting an assurance that it would be fixed.

Claudia sighed, rubbing her temples. “The board is already talking about contingency plans. They’re scared. If we lose too many investors, there won’t be a company left to save.”

On hearing this Eleanor stood abruptly, her cold eyes locking onto Cathryn’s. “You’ve done enough damage,” she said icily, her voice cutting through the air like a blade. “Your father is lying in there because of you. If you hadn’t been so selfish, he wouldn’t be fighting for his life right now.”

Cathryn flinched, the words striking her like a slap to the face. Her mother had finally said what she had been holding back all along.

“Leave this premises immediately! “ She continued, her voice roaring like a thunderstorm!

“And don’t expect me to forgive you, if anything happens to your father”, Elenor added.

Tears welled up in Cathryn’s eyes, but she refused to let them fall. She stood, her legs shaky beneath her, and turned to leave. The weight of her mother’s words pressed down on her, suffocating her as she made her way out of the hospital to a cab.

The decision loomed over her like a dark cloud all through their ride home. Sign the contract, marry San Antonio, save her father’s company, save her family or run. Run away from it all and hope that, somehow, she would find the stranger again.

As she stepped inside their mansion, her mind drifted to the night before. A part of her longed to find Pedro, to hold onto the one thing in her life that had felt real for once.

But was it enough? Could she abandon her family, her father, for a chance at a future she wasn’t even sure existed?

The choice loomed over her like a dark cloud, heavy and suffocating.

She knew that whichever path she chose, there would be no turning back.