The CEO's Regret: Darling, Don’t Leave Me novel Chapter 97

Chapter 75: The Best Card?-1

Vanessa

I leave the room with a straight back, impeccable. Intact on the outside. Inside… no.

The conversation with Clara left me with something I didn’t expect: instability.

She did not shout, she did not defend herself. She did not compete.

She just didn’t give me anything. And that disarmed me more than any provocation.

I walk towards the exit of the building with a firm step, but when the glass doors open and the night air hits my face, I see her.

Clara.

Getting into her car, she moves calmly. No hurry. As if the world isn’t crumbling around her. And then her phone, she picks it up… I watch her. She takes it out of her bag, looks at the screen.

She pauses for a second, she replies.

My chest contracts.

I can’t hear what she says, but I see the subtle change in her expression. She does not smile widely. she

does not melt. But her face barely softens.

That minimal geşture pierces me, I know. It’s him.

I don’t have proof, but I know. And for the first time tonight, something dark settles in my chest.

Hate.

Not towards her as a woman, towards what she provokes.

What does she have? What does she have that I don’t? I’ve been there.

I have been constant, I have been supportive. I have been logical.

She has been history. And apparently that weighs more.

Clara ends the call and starts. Her car gets lost in the lights of the avenue.

I continue to stand for a few seconds. Breathing with controlled difficulty.

୮

I’m not going to stay with this feeling, I’m not going to go to my apartment to imagine scenarios.

I walk towards my vehicle, the driver opens the door.

“Home, miss?”

I look at him. And I make a decision that is not strategic.

It’s emotional.

< Chapter 75–The–Best Card? 1

“Take me to Mr. Blackwood’s.”

He barely blinks.

“It’s late.”

“I didn’t ask the time.”

My voice comes out harder than I expected.

The journey is silent.

+25 Points

I look out the window as the city passes by in patches of light. My mind repeats the scene over and over

again. Clara answering.

That pause… That softness.

I don’t care that it’s late, I don’t care that I’m impulsive. I need to see him.

I need to look at his face when I ask him.

The gate of his house opens after announcing my name.

The housekeeper greets me with a slightly surprised expression.

“Miss Vanessa… The man has already retired to rest.”

“I’ll wait for him.”

I don’t ask for permission, I go in.

The house is quiet. Elegant. Imposing. I always liked this place. I always imagined that one day it would be

mine too. How naïve I was.

I hear footsteps on the upper floor minutes later.

Slow… who descend the wide staircase. And then I see him.\

Ethan.

୮

In pajamas, slightly messy hair. Without the impeccable suit. Without the executive armor.

Human. He stops on the last step when he sees me.

Immediate confusion on his face.

“What are you doing here?”

He does not smile, he does not seem pleased. Only surprised.

That is already a sign.

I stand up slowly.

“Good night to you too.”

2

S

<Chapter 75 The Bect Card? 1

Go down the last steps.

“Vanessa, it’s almost eleven o’clock,”

“I know.”

He crosses his arms, defensively

“Did anything happen at the event?”

Ah.

So he knows we were in the same place.

+25 Points

Interesting, I’m watching him closely. I’m trying to read him like I read contracts, market movements,

financial risks.

But the heart is not a business.

“Did you call her?” I asked bluntly.

His expression barely changes. Minimal, but enough.

“To whom?”

Don’t play with me.

“Clara.”

Silence.

He holds it for two seconds… Three.

“Yes.”

The answer is straightforward. No guilt, no shame.

My jaw tightens.

“And why?”

“Because I wanted to know how she was.”

Simple.

So simple that it hurts.

“Since when have you been worried about how she is?

His gaze hardens.

“Always.”

That hits me, he doesn’t say it as a challenge. He says it as truth.

I take a step closer.

14

Chapter 75–The–Best Card? 1

“Ethan… We’ve built something over the years.”

“I know.”

“I’ve been with you when she wasn’t around.”

“I know that too.”

“Then explain to me why you keep looking at her as if nothing has changed.”

My voice breaks just at the end.

I hate him. I hate that he notices that crack.

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୮

+25 Points>

<Chapter 75–The–Bect Card? 2

Chapter 75: The Best Card?-2

He lowers his gaze for a second. He runs a hand over the back of his neck.

“Vanessa…”

That tone.

It’s not the tone of a man in love.

It’s the tone of someone preparing to disappoint.

“Don’t look at me like that,” I whisper.

“So how?”

“As if I had only been a pause.”

The silence thickens between us.

The whole house seems to hold its breath.

“You were never a pause,” he says finally.

“Then what was I?”

He does not respond immediately. And in that wordless space I find the answer I didn’t want.

I wasn’t love, I was stability.

Convenience, the right company. But not the woman who keeps him awake at night.

I look at him. I really look at him. In pajamas, unarmed.

And I understand something with brutal clarity.

I didn’t come here to confirm if he called her. I came to confirm if I still have room.

“You saw her tonight,” he says suddenly.

It is not a question.

“Yes.”

“And?”

I smile bitterly.

“She’s confident.”

“She always has been.”

purse my lips.

“Not when I was around.”

r

+25 Points

144

<Chapter 75 The Best Card? 2

He looks at me with a mixture of surprise and something else.

Understanding?

“Vanessa…”

“No,” I interrupt him. “Don’t give me rational speeches now.”

I walk a few steps around the room, trying to sort out what I feel.

+25 Points

“Do you know what’s the worst?” I continued. “That she didn’t say anything to me. She did not deny. She

did not affirm. She did not explain.”

He frowns.

“About what?”

“About you.”

That leaves him silent.

“She didn’t give me any information,” I whisper. “And that means she doesn’t owe me anything anymore.”

Ethan takes a deep breath.

“She never owed you anything.”

That phrase falls like a sharp blow. I look at him and for the first time I don’t see the man I wanted to

conquer. I see the man who was never fully mine.

“Are you going back to her?” I finally asked.

The same question that she left suspended.

His eyes are fixed on mine, and there, in that gaze, I see the truth before he speaks.

He doesn’t know, but he wants to. And that’s enough.

Enough for something inside me to fracture. I swallow hard, I’m not going to cry here.

Not in front of him. I straighten up.

I regain my posture.

“I understand,” I say, though I don’t quite understand.

I turn to the door.

“Vanessa,” he calls my name.

I stop, I don’t turn around.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

I close my eyes for a second.

୮

Chapter 75 The Best Card? 2

“You didn’t have to…

+25 Points

“I told you, I don’t understand why you’re asking that question when I told you myself that… that I wanted

my wife back. I told you.”

The memory of the office came back and I swallowed loudly.

“I know…”

But that was what he wanted. I thought she wouldn’t follow that absurd idea.

On the way out. The housekeeper avoids looking directly at me when she opens the door for me.

The night air is colder now, I get in the car without saying a word.

As the driver starts, I look towards the house that I imagined so many times as part of my future.

And for the first time… I’m not sure if I still want to fight for something that was never fully mine.

But one thing I do know. I am not going to lose without understanding every last movement.

Because if Clara believes that silence is power… I haven’t played my best card yet.

The door closed behind me with a sharp sound.

I didn’t look back. I didn’t want to see if he was still there, at the top of the stairs, with that cold expression

he never gave me when he looked at me estranged in meetings… When his attention was mine and mine

alone.

The night air hit my face as soon as I crossed the garden. I took a deep breath. Too deep. Like I need oxygen after being underwater.

I feel bad.

I look up at the sky. Dark. Clean. Indifferent.

How could I convince myself that this was something more?/

I walk to the car with my heels digging into the ground as if they want to remind me of every step I took towards something that never existed. The driver opens the door without asking questions. I slip inside and close my eyes.

For months it was satisfactory. It was delicious, even.

When he ignored his wife at events. When I spoke and he listened with that silent attention. When he

looked for me with his eyes. When he found any excuse to stay talking to me a little longer than he should

It made me feel chosen… Special, superior. But now…

Now I am the ignored one. And that feeling eats away at me inside.

I purse my lips. I hate this. I hate this twinge in the chest that is not love, but it is not simple wounded pride either.

<Chapter 75 The Best Card? 2

What does she have?

+25 Points

That question comes back to my head like an annoying echo. Clara did not attack me. She didn’t yell at

1. me. She didn’t give me any explanation’s.

She looked at me with that damned calm… and left me in the midst of my own doubts.

She didn’t even deny it angrily. She just didn’t give me anything.

And that was worse than any public humiliation

Why did I feed my illusion then? Why did I turn looks into promises? Why did believe that, if I waited long

enough, he would cross that line?

Maybe it was never love. Maybe I just liked to feel like I could destabilize a marriage.

Maybe I liked being the woman he looked at when his wife was by his side.

But tonight he didn’t look at me like that.

Tonight he asked me what I was doing there. As if I were an intruder.

The car moves forward and I watch the city lights blur through the glass.

I feel anger.

Anger with myself, anger with Clara for her damn serenity. Anger at him for not having been clearer… or for

having been too clear this time.

Maybe I idealized a version of him that only existed in my head.

Maybe I built a castle with silences and looks. And now that castle is crumbling.

I put my hand to my chest. It is not romantic pain. It’s something uglier.

It’s ego, it’s pride. It’s having lost a place that was never officially mine.

I

The car pulls up in front of my house. Before I get off, I open my eyes and look at myself in the inirror in

the front seat.

I’m still me, I’m still beautiful, I’m still smart. I’m still desired.

But this time… not by him. And I don’t know if that’s what hurts me the most.

r

I don’t know the name of this sensation, I only know that it hurts. And my body can no longer resist it, !

only identify a single feeling… hate, that’s the clearest one now, I feel hate.

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