Page 186 of Modern Romance September 2025 5-8

She couldn’t breathe. Her head was fuzzy. A deep fog was falling over her, making everything heavy. Everything weak.

‘The baby,’ she breathed, and it trembled from her lips. ‘The baby, Esther…’

And then she could speak no more words.

The phone fell.

And so too did Aurora.

Sebastian was cold.

He knew he’d never be warm again.

He deserved to be cold. To sit here in the abandoned great dining hall, all alone, and freeze.

He probably would.

He turned up the collar on his brown winter fur. The same one he’d laid Aurora’s head upon as he’d kissed her. Found pleasure in her, made love to her.

He closed his eyes. Shut out the empty tables. The empty room.

He’d sent them all away. And they had gone. Esther had taken all his art. All of it had sold the minute he’d left the stage with Aurora.

She’d taken his sculpture, too. It was placed inside the entrance to the building Esther had acquired for him for the headquarters of the charity he was now the face of. Andherface would be the symbol for it. A symbol of hope for all those who needed it.

Amelia’s Wish would be a success. A charity he should have set up the moment he’d been able to. He realised that now.

He realized it because ofher.

Aurora.

It didn’t matter how tightly he squeezed his eyes shut. She was always there. Burnt onto his retinas since the first time he’d turned his head and laid his gaze upon her.

She did not bring him hope.

She was his torment. His endless torture. His punishment.

And this was hell.

His heart hurt. It had not stopped hurting since she’d left. Since he’d forced her to go.

And he endured the hurt, because it was his to endure.

He’d spared her from sharing his fate. He’d saved her, and their child, from living this life with him. They did not deserve to share in his life sentence in this desolate place where nothing lived but pain.

It was the one good thing he’d ever done.

He had not done what he’d wanted to. He had had not crushed her with his love. Suffocated her with his greed to have her, hold her, always.

He had set her free.

And he could barely breathe. The air was too thin without her. His lungs strained for just a single breath of her. His skin ached for her softness.Her closeness.

He’d never be close to her again. He’d never touch her. He’d never again breathe in her scent.

The reckoning was over.

Her job was done.