The rain came in slow sheets that morning, whispering against the windows of the Moretti estate like a thousand soft reprimands. Seraphina sat alone before the great mirror of the guest room—her temporary sanctuary within the Harrington mansion—and looked at the reflection that once commanded the admiration of every room she entered.
She looked flawless, yes. But the perfection had begun to suffocate her. Her face was beautiful, but empty—the kind of beauty that made her ache to remember if she had ever been anything else.
There was a time she would have smiled smugly at her reflection, admired the tilt of her lashes, the curl of her mouth. She would have thought of Adrian as the boy who used to adore that face—the boy who would have traded the world to have her look at him the way she looked at herself.
Now that boy no longer existed.And the man who replaced him regarded her with the same detached civility he used for strangers, or investors, or an assistant late to a meeting.
Every time he passed her in the corridor, the lack of reaction felt like an incision.A clean, deliberate wound she couldn't show.
Seraphina hadn't realized, until lately, how silent the house had become. The Harrington mansion—once filled with laughter, music, the rustle of her dresses as she'd drifted from room to room—now existed as a mausoleum of order. Every object was symmetrical. Every clock synchronized. The staff spoke in low, deferential tones as if even their words needed to be measured against the rhythm of their master's control.
And she couldn't stand it.
She would try to catch him before work, walking briskly through the hall, his coat already on, his tie perfectly fastened. "Adrian," she'd start, reaching for something soft, something human. But his eyes would flick to her once—briefly, politely—and he'd step around her, offering nothing but a quiet, "We'll talk another time."
There never was another time.
At first, she thought it was arrogance. A test, perhaps, to see how much she wanted him. But as the weeks dragged into months, and the government delay in processing the annulment stretched on, she began to understand: it wasn't pride. It wasn't resentment.
It was indifference.
He no longer cared enough to fight her.
And for someone like Seraphina, who had thrived all her life on attention—desired or not—his indifference was the cruelest punishment of all.
She began to watch him, quietly, from corners of hallways or the shadows of open doors. He worked tirelessly, surrounded by files and holographic projections of corporate analytics. His face, once animated with boyish arrogance, was calm now, almost serene in its exhaustion.
He spoke little. Ate less. Slept, if at all, on the chaise near his desk rather than in the bed they had once imagined sharing.
She had once wished, after hearing of his parents' deaths, that he had died with them.
The memory made her sick now.
She'd been in Florence then—living carelessly, attending galas, too self-absorbed to grasp what that loss had meant. When the news came, she'd poured herself a drink and murmured, "Poor Adrian." Her friends had nodded, some pitying, some smug. She remembered thinking—coldly, thoughtlessly—that it might even be for the best. That his parents' passing would humble him, break that reckless pride she used to loathe.
She hadn't realized that it wouldn't break him—it would rebuild him.
She hadn't realized she would one day stand before him and see a man who no longer needed anyone, least of all her.
Now, sitting before the mirror, she wondered how differently things might have gone if she had called. Just one message. One word of condolence. Anything to remind him that someone still remembered the boy who used to call her Sera like it was sacred.
But she hadn't called. She'd chosen silence.And he'd taken that silence as her answer.
The clock ticked on, each second a reminder that time had moved forward for him, but not for her.
When she had returned to New York months later, everything about him had shifted—the way he walked, the way he spoke, the way he seemed to belong to some higher order of gravity. She had thought, naïvely, that her return would unsettle him. That one glance of her eyes, one tremor of her voice, would remind him of what they'd once shared.
But she'd underestimated how deeply he'd buried his past.
He looked at her not with hatred, nor sadness, but with complete detachment—like a man studying an old photograph and wondering why he had ever smiled in it.
That first dinner back had been unbearable. He'd spoken little, focused on his tablet, barely acknowledging her presence except to answer questions with mechanical courtesy.
Her parents had been thrilled. "He still let you come back into his circle, Sera. That's something," her father had said.Her mother, pragmatic as ever, had added, "Men like him always remember their first love. You just have to remind him who you are."
But the truth was, he hadn't forgotten.He had simply outgrown her.
Now, she spent her evenings wandering the empty corridors, the rain sliding down the windows like liquid glass. She remembered the first time she had visited this house, before his parents' deaths—the laughter, the grand dinners, the way Adrian's father had called her princess. Lysandra Harrington had been reserved, but kind; she had watched the two of them dance at a winter gala, her eyes soft, as though she already saw a future binding their families.
And now both were gone. Their portraits still hung in the hall, immaculate, staring down at her like gods of a vanished age.
She found herself stopping before them sometimes, whispering apologies she would never say aloud. "I should've come sooner," she'd murmur to the empty frames. "I should've been there when he needed someone."
Her voice would waver, but no tears came. She didn't cry—not because she was strong, but because she didn't know how to anymore.
Her desperation crept in slowly. She started to wait outside his office, pretending she needed to ask something trivial about a dinner or a letter from her parents. He would listen politely, then excuse himself, every word a boundary.
She tried bringing him coffee once—his old favorite, the one he used to demand with too much sugar and a ridiculous amount of cream. But when she placed it on his desk, he didn't even glance at it. "I don't drink that anymore," he said softly. "Too sweet."
She wanted to laugh, to scream—something. Too sweet. The phrase stung more than it should have.
Because she realized, in that moment, that he'd meant more than the drink.
That night, she sat by the window again, knees pulled close, watching the drizzle darken the gardens. The air smelled like earth and rain and regret.
"Why did it change?" she whispered.
She replayed memories like broken reels in her mind—the way he used to look at her in crowded rooms, the ridiculous poems he'd written, the childish declarations of eternal love. She used to roll her eyes at them, embarrassed by how sincere he was.
But now she would have given anything to see that expression again—to see anything in his face that proved he still felt something.
Instead, she lived in a house where he passed her like a ghost.
Her thoughts began to spiral. What if she had never left? What if she hadn't laughed at his love, hadn't treated him like an accessory to her ambition? What if she had reached out when the world collapsed on him?
The guilt built like static beneath her skin until it felt like a fever.
She tried to sleep that night, but the silence was unbearable. In her dreams—or perhaps her waking delusions—she saw flashes of the past: Adrian's laughter, his hand reaching for hers, the glint of sunlight on his hair in their university courtyard. Then, suddenly, his eyes now—cold, unrecognizing, distant.
She woke gasping, her throat tight, tears streaming down her face before she even realized she was crying.
Morning came like punishment.
She dressed carefully, painting her face into composure, rehearsing the words she would say to him. Maybe it wasn't too late. Maybe, if she could just speak honestly, he would understand that she regretted it all. That she never truly meant to abandon him. That she had been young, and foolish, and cruel.
But when she went to find him, he was already gone. The guards said he'd left early for a meeting abroad—Zurich, perhaps. A last-minute board restructuring.
He hadn't told her.
Of course he hadn't.
She stood in the entryway as the car disappeared down the drive, her heart thudding hollowly.
The house seemed to exhale in his absence—too quiet, too vast. She looked around and realized, with a sharp ache, that even surrounded by luxury, she had never felt so small.
She returned to her room and sat before the mirror once more.
The woman staring back at her looked like Seraphina Moretti, but she wasn't sure she still was. Somewhere between Florence and New York, between vanity and regret, between pride and humiliation, she had lost whatever made her real.
And now, when she thought of Adrian, it wasn't as the man she wanted—it was as the man she destroyed without realizing it.
Her whisper broke the stillness:
"I should've called. I should've said something… before the silence swallowed him whole."
But the only answer was the rain against the glass—soft, relentless, and too late.