Reborn at Eighteen The Billionaire's Second Chance novel Chapter 198

‘Or you,” he finished quietly. “Even if it means making it look like I don’t care about you. Yes.”

The silence that followed felt enormous, filling the space between us with everything we couldn’t say, everything that acknowledging out loud would make

real and therefore impossible to take back.

I stared at him, at this man who had hurt me and controlled me and chosen someone else over me again and again, and saw something I’d never quite let myself see before: that maybe, in his own twisted and insufficient way, he had been trying to protect me. That maybe every cold dismissal, every public distance, every careful separation had been his attempt to shield me from exactly the kind of scrutiny and speculation I was facing now.

It didn’t make it right. It didn’t erase the pain or the manipulation or the fundamental wrongness of everything that had happened between us. But it made it more complicated than I’d wanted it to be, made him more human than the villain I’d needed him to be.

“I should go,” I said finally, because I didn’t know what else to say, because if I stayed in this room with him looking at me like that I might do something. foolish like forgive him or believe him or fall back into the pattern of hoping he would choose me. “People will notice if I’m gone too long.”

“Elara.” My name again, rough with something that might have been desperation. “Wait. Just–before you go, I need you to know that what I said up there, about the investigation and the compensation–I meant all of it. Whoever sabotaged your materials, whoever is behind the attacks on your credibility, I will find them. And I will make sure they can never hurt you again.”

“Why?” The question escaped before I could stop it. “Why does it matter so much to you?”

He looked at me for a long moment, his eyes searching mine as if trying to find the answer written somewhere in my face. When he finally spoke, his voice was barely above a whisper.

“Because when I saw your painting today–that broken window with the new growth coming through the cracks–I finally understood what I’d done to you. What we all did to you. And I realized that if I don’t do everything in my power to make sure you can heal and grow and become everything you’re meant to be, then I’m just another person breaking you all over again.”

The words hit me like a confession, like an apology, like something that might have been the beginning of redemption if either of us believed in such things anymore. I wanted to be angry. I wanted to throw his words back at him and tell him it was too late, that he’d made his choices and I’d made mine and there was no going back.

“I have to go,” I said again, and this time I didn’t wait for permission. I turned toward the door, my vision still blurry with tears I refused to acknowledge, my hands shaking as I reached for the handle.

‘Elara.

I stopped but didn’t turn around.

“For what it’s worth,” Julian said quietly, I’m proud of you. Not because you placed second, but because you kept going even when everyone was trying to tear you down. That takes more strength than most people will ever have.”

I closed my eyes against the fresh wave of emotion his words triggered. Then, without looking back, I opened the door and walked out, leaving Julien standing alone by the windows with all the things we still hadn’t said hanging in the air between us like ghosts.

Atlas was waiting in the corridor, his expression as professionally neutral as ever. He didn’t ask if I was okay, didn’t comment on my red–rimmed eyes or the way my hands trembled as I smoothed down my jacket. He simply gestured toward a different exit–a private elevater that would take me down to a side entrance, away from the cameras and questions and crowds.

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7:13 pm

Chapter 198

“Thank you,” I managed, my voice hoarse.

He nodded once. “Take care of yourself, Miss Vance. And for what it’s worth–he meant every word he said up there. I’ve worked for Mr. Vane for several years, and I’ve never seen him sacrifice business interests for personal reasons before today.”

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