Chapter 81 The Empty House
Mark’s POV
“I can’t do this… I can’t… just drive.”
That was the last thing I told the chauffeur before I slumped back in the seat like a man whose bones had turned to dust.
The humiliation still burned like acid under my skin.
The reporters. The cameras. The CEO spitting my downfall into microphones like it had been rehearsed.
By the time the car rolled to a stop in front of my building, I was drunk enough that the world had edges but no center.
I barely made it into the penthouse. I staggered my way to the door, having a hard time with the password. But regardless, I got in.
The door clicked behind me, and I didn’t even bother turning on the lights.
I dropped my suit jacket on the floor. My tie somewhere else. My shoes… I don’t even remember taking them off. All I knew was that I could still hear their voices in my head:
“Is Simmons collapsing?”
“Are you unfit to lead?”
“Is it true you were rejected by Daesen Energy?”
My chest tightened until breathing felt like work.
I staggered to the living room and let myself fall onto the couch face-first.
No shower. No food. No thought.
Just that crushing mix of shame, alcohol, and exhaustion.
I didn’t see anything around me. Not the candles. Not the petals. Not the table she had set.
I didn’t see her nor her shadow.
I passed out.
The sun rose early in the city of Atlanta. It's rays shone directly into my eyes.
I woke up to a sharp pain and hammering head.
My tongue felt like cotton. My body felt like I’d been scraped across a sidewalk.
I groaned and pushed myself up slowly.
That’s when I smelled it.
Not alcohol nor sweat.
It was something with a magnificent fragrance.
Sweet. Floral.
Roses!
My eyes opened fully.
My living room was decorated with dozen of candles, though they wer melted into soft pools of wax.
Rose petals were scattered on the table, across the floor, trailing toward the bedroom.
Plates set for two. Two glasses of wine.
A meal, now cold but beautifully made.
A soft, delicate lingerie set folded neatly on the bed.
And then the worst blow, far worse than Daesen.
Her perfume still lingering.
I froze.
Like my brain couldn’t understand what I was seeing.
Like the room was speaking a language I wasn’t ready to hear.
Becca… had been here.
And she had left.
My throat tightened so violently I had to grip the back of the couch to steady myself.
My legs felt weak. My chest… my chest felt like someone had reached in and twisted something vital.
I walked through the penthouse slowly, not trusting myself to breathe too fast.
Petals on the stairs.
Music paused mid-song on the speakers.
Her sweater, one I loved folded on the edge of the bed.
“God…” I whispered. “What did I do?”
The guilt hit me all at once like a flood breaking through a dam.
I had come home drunk, spiraling, drowning in my own disaster… while she had been here preparing something for me.
Something gentle and loving.
And I hadn’t even seen it.
I rubbed both hands over my face, trying to hold myself together. It didn’t work. My hands shook anyway.
She called me.
I didn’t answer.
I didn’t text her.
I didn’t even notice she was here.
That thought alone shattered something in me.
I grabbed my keys and left.
I drove to her house like a man running from a fire.
I didn’t even feel the steering wheel under my palms. I just moved, breath short, pulse erratic, panic coiled tight around my ribs.
Her street was quiet when I pulled up.
Her curtains were open. The lights were off.
Her car wasn’t in the driveway.
Her shoes weren’t by her door.
My stomach dropped.
“Becca?” I whispered, even though I hadn’t stepped out of the car yet.
The word didn’t make it any less real.
I knocked but to no answer.
I knocked again, harder this time. Still i got nothing.
My heart began thundering, loud and violent, shaking every thought loose.
I grabbed my phone and dialed someone who might know without asking too many questions.
Danielle. She was still in school, which made this easier.
“Hi, Danielle.” I forced my voice to sound normal. “Just checking… has Becca stopped by recently?”
“No,” she said. “Not today. Why?”
I swallowed hard. “Just needed to drop something off for her. It’s fine.”
There was a pause.
“Are you sure everything’s okay?” she asked.
No, nothing was okay.
But I wasn’t about to tell her that.
“Yeah,” I lied. “Thanks.”
I hung up and exhaled shakily.
There was no reason for her not to be home.
No reason for her to disappear.
Not unless,
No!
I refused to finish that thought.
I stood there on her porch, feeling the world tilt sideways.
My phone rang.
The sharp, loud sound that felt like it cut straight through my skull.
I didn’t check the caller ID.
I already knew.
Olivia.
I pressed decline instantly.
My thumb hovered over the screen, something in my chest twisting. I opened the call log.
Her name wasn’t the one that mattered.
It was the number underneath it.
Becca_ 37 missed calls.
For a second, everything inside me went silent.
Then it hit.
A physical punch more like a void.
Thirty-seven.
She had called me, she tried to reach me.
And I never picked up.
I closed my eyes hard. My breathing stuttered. My chest felt too tight to hold anything, air, reason, regret.
I pressed the phone to my forehead, as if grounding myself would stop the pain.
“Where are you, baby?” I whispered.
The words barely left my lips.
They fell apart halfway through.
And the world didn’t answer.
Across the city…
A lone figure walked down an empty stretch of road lit only by streetlamps.
Becca.
Her shoulders were small beneath the weight of heartbreak. Her suitcase rolled behind her, bumping over cracks in the pavement.
Her eyes were red. Her steps slow.
She didn’t go home.
She just walked.
Too heartbroken to turn back.
And somewhere behind her…
the petals in my penthouse were still scattered on the floor.
I tried to get a hold of her but she slipped passed by grip, like a ghost…