Chapter 58

Ian – POV

“Pick up, silly girl!” I growled, slamming my fist against the arm of my office chair. It spun slightly with the force, the leather groaning beneath me.

The phone buzzed in my hand—straight to voicemail. Again.

“Mia,” I muttered under my breath, jaw clenched tight.

She was dodging my calls now. Typical. Always running when things got messy. But this time, it wasn’t about feelings, love, or the thousand little arguments we left unresolved between kisses and slammed doors. No—this was business.

My company had just locked in a potential game-changing collaboration with her firm. Her signature was the final key. Just one damn name on a dotted line, and we could break into the European market like kings. But she was the CEO. Her word was law.

And she wasn’t picking up.

I stood, pacing the room, the city lights outside casting jagged shadows across my desk. My office was high-rise, expensive, cold. Just like I liked it. But right now, it felt like a goddamn prison.

I dialed her again. Ring. Ring. Voicemail.

I sat back down, raked both hands through my hair, and hissed, “Don’t do this, Mia. Don’t let your pride kill this.”

I gave it one last try.

The line connected.

“Hello?” Her voice was sharp, dry. Not her usual fire—this was scorched earth.

“Mia. Finally. Listen—”

“No, you listen!” she snapped. “Don’t call me. Don’t even think about calling me right now.”

My heart dropped.

“What the hell happened?”

“Oh, don’t act like you care,” she said with a bitter laugh. “Where was this energy when I flew back into town and you looked at me like I was some side character in your perfect little world?”

“Mia, you vanished without saying anything. You left in the middle of us trying to—”

“To build something?” she interrupted. “Spare me. I left for work. For a deal that would benefit both of us. I didn’t disappear to Bali with a lover.”

My hands balled into fists on the desk.

“This isn’t about Bali or lovers. It’s about communication. You shut me out.”

She laughed again, this time colder.

“Oh, now you want communication? Now that your precious business deal needs my approval?”

I froze.

“Mia, this isn’t about that—”

“Liar. Don’t insult my intelligence.”

“Mia, it’s more than business. I called because I care.”

“Oh, you care?” Her voice broke—just a little. “Then where the hell were you when I walked into that house and my own mother hurled a phone at my head?”

Silence.

“What?”

“You heard me.” Her voice cracked, emotion finally pushing through. “She threw it. Hit me so hard I blacked out. Woke up on the floor, head bleeding, and she just sat there like she was waiting for applause.”

I stood from my chair, stunned. My throat tightened.

“Jesus, Mia... are you okay now? Did you go to a hospital?”

“Don’t pretend to be concerned, Ian.”

“I’m not pretending,” I snapped back, pain lacing my words. “You think I wouldn’t care if you were hurt? You think that low of me?”

“You made it clear I wasn’t a priority,” she whispered. “So yeah, I believed it.”

I exhaled sharply, dragging a hand down my face. “I didn’t know, Mia. I didn’t know she did that.”

“She said I couldn’t keep a man because of my ‘behavior.’ Then I reminded her she couldn’t keep you know who—and that was it. She snapped.”

There it was. The unspoken war between them—mother and daughter, pride and pain, history and damage all bleeding into one ugly explosion. And now here she was, trying to hold herself together with that same fierce, flawed pride that I used to admire. Still admired, if I was honest.

I sat back down slowly, the edge of guilt pressing into my spine.

“I’m sorry,” I said quietly.

She didn’t respond for a few seconds. “I didn’t call for apologies.”

“I called you.”

“Right. Because you need something.”

“No. Because I missed you.”

Silence again.

“I missed the way you challenge me. The way you light up a room and set it on fire. You drive me insane, Mia. And yeah, this deal? It matters. But not more than you.”

“Stop talking like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you still care.”

“I do.”

“No, you don’t,” she said softly. “Because if you did, you wouldn’t have looked at me like I was nothing. You wouldn’t have stood there with your hands in your pockets while I broke in front of you.”

I swallowed hard, trying to form the words. But she wasn’t done.

“I need space, Ian. I need to breathe without all of you pressing in.”

“Mia, please—”

“I’m serious. Stay away from me for now. Don’t call. Don’t text. Don’t send flowers or fancy gestures. I don’t want them.”

The line was quiet, hanging by a thread.

“Do you still love me?” I asked before I could stop myself.

A sharp inhale. A silence that crushed me.

“I don’t know,” she said finally. “Right now, I’m too busy trying not to hate you.”

Then the line went dead.

I stared at my phone for a long time. The city outside kept moving, oblivious to the storm I’d helped create.

Somewhere out there, Mia was driving through the night, bleeding, hurting, alone. And I couldn’t touch her. Couldn’t reach her.

All because I forgot how to love her when it mattered most.

The line went dead.

I stared at the black screen for a moment, hoping—stupidly—that it would light up again with her name. Maybe she’d call back. Maybe I hadn’t just destroyed the last thread connecting us.

But nothing.

The silence in my office screamed louder than her voice ever had.

“Dammit!” I roared, and before I could stop myself, I hurled the phone across the room.

It hit the wall with a sickening crack, shattering into pieces—plastic, metal, glass scattering like shrapnel across the floor.

I stood there, chest heaving, the weight of everything crashing down at once. My heart thundered. My jaw clenched so hard I thought I might crack a tooth.

She said she might hate me.

She said stay away.