The CEO's Regret: Darling, Don’t Leave Me novel Chapter 7

Chapter 6: Back Home-2

Three years later, nothing had changed in me… in Clara, the woman, the professional. My father managed to further position the company, and that made me happy; my family was doing very well… but me… What did I gain? I was still there, still supporting, helping my husband, without even deserving a thank you in a

speech.

Could I really have settled for so little all this time? How had I not realized it? Without a doubt, love is blind

too blind.

Sitting in that station, with the noise of buses coming and going, I understood something that struck me with profound sadness. It wasn’t marriage that took away my dreams; it was me who left them behind to

fit into a life that never asked me to be the protagonist.

Ethan didn’t forbid me anything, he didn’t demand that I give up anything. He simply filled all the space…

and I learned to make myself small.

I wiped my tears with the back of my hand and took a deep breath. Perhaps that’s why it hurt so much. Because I couldn’t blame him entirely. Because no one forced me to stop being Clara Sinclair. I did it out of love, out of hope, out of that absurd faith that one day he would look at me the way I looked at him.

I opened my eyes and looked around.

I didn’t know exactly what I would do when I returned to my parents’ house. I didn’t know how to rebuild what I had left behind. But I did know one thing with absolute certainty: I wouldn’t lose myself for anyone

again.

I wouldn’t put my life on hold again, waiting to be chosen.

Clara Sinclair hadn’t disappeared. She had only been waiting for me to remember her.

And as the loudspeaker announced the departure of another bus, I understood that this time I wasn’t running away from something… I was returning to the point where it all began.

My bus was announced, I stood up, and walked on autopilot. I don’t know how my brain could still

function.

The bus departed shortly after dawn. I chose the window seat and pressed my forehead against the cold glass as the city began to recede into the distance. New York slowly faded away, building by building, as if it had never been mine. Perhaps it never was.

I could have taken a flight. A couple of hours and I’d be at my parents’ house. Ethan would have done that efficiency, speed, solving problems without feeling. But I didn’t want to get there quickly. I needed time.

I needed those hours suspended between one place and another to understand at what precise point my life had changed direction.

The bus engine vibrated beneath my feet. My suitcase rested in the overhead compartment, light for what

little it contained, heavy for all that it represented.

Three years living in a city I never truly felt was mine. Three years adapting to routines I didn’t choose, to silences I learned to accept as normal, to a huge house where there was always space… except for me.

As the cityscape transformed into long highways and open fields, I let the memories wash over me

without resistance.

I remembered my first day in New York as a wife. The immaculate apartment. The flowers. The perfect

welcome, arranged by assistants who smiled at me with professional respect, not affection. How naive I

was

The bus traveled for hours. Brief stops. People getting on and off. Other people’s conversations passing by

without touching me. I remained silent, watching my blurry reflection in the window.

I left my tears at that station, with the woman who understood that I had lived in the shadow of a surname that wasn’t hers. Now, only a strange, fragile, but real calm remained.

When the landscape began to change again-greener, wider, more familiar-I knew I was close.

A

My hometown had always had something that New York never managed to give me: space to breathe.

As evening fell, the bus finally pulled into the terminal. I got out of the car slowly, stretched my numb legs, and picked up my suitcase. The air was different. Warmer. Closer. It smelled like home… though I still didn’t know if that home was waiting for me or if it only existed in my memory.

I hailed a taxi and gave the address without hesitation. I knew that house by heart, even after years of

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