The CEO's Regret: Darling, Don’t Leave Me novel Chapter 26

Chapter 18: Like a Triumph-1

Clara

The building still didn’t feel like a headquarters, it felt like an idea.

The echo of my footsteps bounced off the bare walls as I walked through what, in a few months, would be the main meeting room. The concrete was exposed, the columns uncovered, the windows still covered with temporary protectors. Nothing was definitive, but everything was decided.

Phase one of this great project was barely underway.

I liked to be there when there was no one else, no voices, no opinions. Without external expectations.

I spread out the plans on a makeshift table and watched them carefully. The distribution of offices, common spaces, the location of the teams. Every decision had weight. Each line drawn was a way of saying something new begins here.

L

Phase one did not admit errors. New York did not forgive improvisations, that phrase I heard frequently

from someone.

I took a deep breath and rested both hands on the table. I thought about how quickly everything had happened since the awards. The recognition, the congratulations, the curious looks. I still didn’t fully assimilate it. Not because I doubted I deserved it, but because for so long I had worked in silence that the

noise still seemed alien to me.

I was alone in the meeting. The technical team had left minutes before. Alexander had had to travel for a couple of days to attend to business of his other company, and although I fully trusted him, I appreciated that space to think without interruptions.

I checked the times again. I mentally adjusted budgets. I visualized the movement of the place once it was in operation.

That’s when my phone vibrated on the table.

Alexander, I saw his name on the screen.

I answered without hesitation.

“Hello, all right?” I asked.

“Everything is under control,” he replied. “But I need to ask you something.”

I barely straightened up, as if he could see me.

“Tell me.”

There was a brief pause, just enough for something to settle in my chest.

“A company is requesting our services.”

Chapte

frowned, surprised.

“New?” I said. “Alexander, we are not yet installed as such. We are only in phase one.”

“I know,” he replied calmly. “That is precisely why it caught my attention.”

I walked slowly to one of the windows and looked at the city through the protective plastic. The traffic

continued its course. Nothing stopped.

“Then,” I said carefully, “why us?”

He smiled, I knew by the tone of his voice.

“Because they love us, Clara. No to infrastructure. Not the name of the building. To us.”

I felt a warm, contained impulse running through my body. It wasn’t fear. There was no doubt.

It was recognition.

“It’s a big contract,” he added. “Very big. They want a meeting as soon as possible.”

I rested my forehead against the cold glass and closed my eyes for a second. I thought about everything I had done to get here. In the times I hesitated. In the decisions I made alone. In what I had left behind in

order to move forward.

“Are you willing to go to that meeting?” He finally asked.

I didn’t have to think about it.

I opened my eyes, straightened up, and looked at the blurred reflection that the glass was throwing back

at me. I was no longer the woman waiting for instructions. Nor the one that needed validation.

“Yes,” I answered. “I’m ready for anything.”

On the other end of the line, Alexander exhaled, satisfied.

“Then get ready,” he said. “This has just begun.”

I hung up slowly and put the phone down on the table.

The building was still empty. The echo was still there. The plans were still extended.

But it was no longer just an idea. It was an opportunity, and I was ready to take it.

It only took two days, two days to go to that place and ratify that I had come to New York.

I entered the building with the certainty that there was no turning back.

It wasn’t nervousness that I felt. Nor is there an expectation. It was something more sober, firmer. A

strange calm that only appears when you know that, no matter what, you are no longer playing to please

anyone.

Trump!

The elevatur went up slowly Too much. I looked at my reflection in the polished mirror of the metal walls and recognized myself… and at the same time not. The brown hair fell straight over my shoulders, without artifice. The dark suit marked a silhouette that did not seek softness. I didn’t want to look nice. I wanted to see myself capable. And it was.

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