Chapter 5 Leaving Without Looking Back
1307 Words
— Sebastian's POV —
One year since that name disappeared from my life. One year since those divorce papers were signed without a single tear.
I thought that after a year, everything would feel normal. Turns out I was wrong.
The Annual Hispania Raya Entrepreneurs' Gala was always the same night, every year grand halls, expensive ties, and champagne glasses raised for causes that never really changed. I had attended more than ten times. The faces didn't vary much either.
Except tonight.
"Mr. De Luca, would you like something to drink?" A young server approached with a tray in hand.
"No, thank you," I replied shortly. He nodded and moved on. I turned my gaze toward the entrance an old habit that had never quite gone away.
She walked in with someone beside her. A simple black dress, cut cleanly at the shoulder, her hair pinned up with a few strands left to fall loosely at the sides of her face. Her posture was straight not the kind that comes from training, but the kind that simply is. A faint smile on her lips as she nodded to someone who greeted her near the door.
I didn't recognize her immediately. Then she turned slightly, and the light in the room caught the edge of her face.
"Isabella?" I murmured.
My eyes didn't move from her.
Isabella Castellano my ex wife walked into this room with a presence I had never once imagined in any version of her I had known. She was no longer the woman who had come into my life with a contract in hand, shoulders slightly tensed every time I walked into the same room as her. This was a different Isabella. A version I never knew existed.
The man standing beside her, speaking quietly into her ear while nodding toward other guests, was Marco Bellini.
"De Luca." Rodrigo clapped a hand on my arm. "You look like you've seen a ghost."
"Excuse me." I cut off whatever he was about to say. "We'll continue later."
I walked away without waiting for his response. I took a glass from a passing server's tray not because I was thirsty, but because my hand needed something to hold then found a corner far enough away to watch without looking like I was watching.
Marco was speaking with his usual energy, gesturing broadly. Isabella responded calmly, smiling faintly now and then, nodding occasionally. No tension in her shoulders. No restlessness in her eyes.
"Watching guests from the corner of the room? That's not like you." Marco's voice came from directly behind me.
I turned. He was standing alone with a glass in hand, wearing that wide smile I knew far too well. Isabella was no longer beside him.
"It's been a while," I said, greeting him briefly.
"You look like you've seen a ghost," Marco repeated, quieter this time.
"The woman you were with," I said directly. "Who is she?"
Marco raised an eyebrow. Then his smile widened in a way I didn't particularly like. "Oh. You've seen her?"
"Answer the question."
Marco let out a small sigh, but his eyes were bright. "Isabella Castellano. Legal Manager at Bellini Group. She's been with us for almost a year." He paused. "Why? Do you know her?"
I didn't answer right away.
"Somewhat," I said finally.
Marco held my gaze a beat longer than necessary. "Somewhat," he repeated quietly, his tone flat but with the corner of his mouth lifting just slightly. "Alright then."
He didn't push further. But I'd known Marco long enough to understand that "alright then" from him never truly meant he'd accepted the answer.
"Legal Manager," I said, more to myself. "She studied law?"
"Of course." Marco looked mildly surprised. "Top graduate from Westbridge University, c*m laude." He tilted his head. "Why? Is there a problem?"
"No."
Marco studied me for a moment. "You're seriously telling me you only know her 'somewhat'?"
I didn't answer. And that, apparently, was enough to make Marco smile again before he clapped me on the shoulder and turned away.
"I have a client to greet. We'll talk later."
I stayed where I was after he left.
Six years ago. When I first met Isabella, she had just graduated. I never asked what she had studied. I never asked much about Isabella Vargas at all.
And it turned out she was a law graduate top of her class, no less.
"Sebastian."
I didn't need to turn around to know who it was. The voice hadn't changed but there was something different inside it. Gone was the carefulness that used to be there every time she said my name.
I turned.
Isabella stood facing me, her eyes meeting mine directly without wavering. Back then, her eyes always held something behind them the effort to appear fine, a waiting she never put into words. Now there was only calm. Clear and still.
"Isabella." I returned her tone in kind.
"I didn't expect to run into you here." She lifted her chin slightly.
"Neither did I," I answered. A truth I rarely admitted so easily.
She gave a small smile not the kind meant to put anyone at ease, but the kind that was simply already there. The room around us kept humming with the clink of glasses, laughter, layers of conversation but between us it felt like a silence that made no sound.
"Good evening?" she asked.
"Same as always," I said.
"Hmm." She nodded once, her gaze drifting briefly across the room before returning to me. "Are you well?"
A simple question. But coming from her lips, in that tone without weight, without any hidden expectation behind it. It landed heavier than it should have.
"Same as always," I said again.
The corner of her mouth moved. "You always answer with the same line."
I didn't deny it. I looked at her for a few seconds long enough to see that not a single part of her resembled who she used to be. The way she stood, the way she held my gaze without looking away, the way her smile appeared without needing anyone's permission.
"Isabella." Her name left my mouth before I had decided to say it. "You work for Marco?"
Her eyes didn't flicker. "Yes."
"How long?"
"Almost a year." She tilted her head slightly. "Is there something you need to ask about that?"
I was quiet for a moment. There was nothing I needed to ask. Nothing I needed to say. And yet my feet didn't move, and my mouth didn't quite close.
"No," I said at last.
"Alright." She nodded once. Briefly. Then her gaze shifted toward the crowd. "I should get back. There are a few things I need to take care of tonight."
She turned.
"Isabella."
I didn't know why I said her name. There was nothing I needed to say. Nothing worth holding her back for.
She stopped. But she didn't turn around. A few seconds passed long enough to feel, not long enough to become anything.
"Enjoy your evening, Sebastian."
Then she walked away. Her steps were light and certain, with no hesitation in them, no pause to glance back. Exactly as she had done a year ago, walking through the gates of my house.
I stood in the same spot, watching her back disappear into the crowd.
One year. She had built all of that in one year.
"Turns out you know her more than just somewhat." Marco appeared beside me again. His voice was low, not judgmental but sharp enough.
I didn't answer.
"She's the only Legal Manager who has ever argued with me in her very first meeting and turned out to be right." There was a pride in Marco's voice he didn't bother to hide. "That woman is remarkable, Sebastian."
I knew.
I just knew it far too late.
- Writer
