Chapter 3 Chapter 3 After the silence

AUTHOR'S POV

"I never should have sent you off."

Selene's tone sliced through the quiet hum of the city outside the apartment window, her hand clamped firmly onto the edge of her coffee mug. Elora did not answer right away. She sat before her, legs folded up beneath her on the couch, staring blankly at the steam rising from her cup.

"I just figured.maybe it would help you find some kind of peace," Selene said. "Closure, maybe. I don't know. But if I'd known it would break you like that-if I'd known what he'd do, El, I swear to God, I would've prevented you from going."

Elora raised her eyes slowly. They weren't angry. Weary, yes. Worn in a way time hadn't erased. "It wasn't your fault."

"It does feel like it was." Selene muttered.

Elora sighed as she settled into the couch, the soft fabric chill on her elbows. Manhattan light casted in through the window, casting a golden ray of sunlight around them. It had been years. Three? Four? Days lost her attention as they passed by. Time runs out differently when you stop expecting anything at all.

"I've got no calls from them, Selene. Not one. Not even a single message." Elora's voice trembled, "I wonder sometimes if my own daughter remembers me."

Selene set her own mug down and sat beside her on the couch, placing her hand gently on Elora's knee. "Of course, she remembers you. She was just a child. She probably isn't aware of what really happened."

Elora laughed bitterly. "She doesn't need to know. Lucian saw to that. He cut me loose from her so neatly, it was as if I never existed. As if I was just..a phase."

The silence that followed wasn't awkward, just deafening.

When she first landed from the subway into Manhattan after getting humiliated by her husband, she could barely breathe. The city was noisy and pretty fast, a disrupting shock to the throbbing quiet that lived inside her. But she survived anyway. That first night, after she hauled her suitcase into the small apartment Selene had leased for her, she cried on the floor until her eyes were dried of tears. Then she stood up, washed her face, and typed out her letter of resignation.

She didn't even hesitate to resign from Weston's company. She printed it off the next morning and personally took it to the headquarters. Lucian's name was still on the building and she wanted nothing to do with anything that has to do with him or his name.

That part of her life was over. Atleast, that's what she tried to tell herself.

Then she started all over again. Selene found her a position at a tech company, one where no one knew her name or past. She worked tirelessly--days and nights, even weekends, whatever it took to keep her mind busy. She moved up quickly. She got promoted after a year, and with them, an endless stream of achievements that silence the pain

but never truly filled the space she'd lost.

But however, she walked away from it. There were moments that the sorrow visited her like an approaching wave that she did not anticipate.

Seeing a child in the subway tightly embracing her mother.

A father yelling his daughter's name in the park.

Every time she heard the name "Nora,"

Each time, she'd smile like it doesn't hurt.

She'd blink the burn away and keep going, keep working, keep living. Because what else does she have left to fight for.

"I was mad at him," Elora whispered, "But I think I was more angry at myself. For thinking he would fight for us. For thinking he wouldn't shove me out the minute he found his true mate.

"Maybe he was afraid....or confused."

"No," Elora answered flatly. "He was selfish."

Selene did not argue. She simply nodded and let Elora pour out her mind.

"I supposed a part of me.a small part of me expected he would call one day. Maybe he'd want to explain, or ask how I was doing, or at least let me talk to Nora. But he didn't. He never did. And I didn't bother either." Her throat tightened. "What sort of Mother does that make me?"

"A hurting one, one that's going through a lot." Selene exhaled. "A woman who did all she could."

Elora turned her face away, her eyes laced with tears. But she had promised herself, she would not weep. Not again. Not for a man who chose to cut her out."

"I suppose I just have to accept it," she said to her. "That she's gone. That he made sure I'd no longer be a part of her life. And he probably sleeps just fine at night because of it."

She stood up and walked over the window, arms crossed tightly across her chest as she glanced down at the city.

Selene stood beside her, "Don't ever think you're not enough. Because that's never true. He made a choice. That choice doesn't state your worth."

Elora let her forehead fall forward, her eyes shut as she whispered. "I just miss her. That's all. Just her."

They stood there together for a while.

She had no clue what the future would bring. Maybe Nora would ever come back to look for her. Maybe Lucian would ever face what he'd done. But in that moment, she had this life she built with her own hands. It wasn't much. But it was hers.

And that was enough--at least for now.

She decided to step in and get some work done. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard, the sound of keypads suddenly loud in the silence. Elora leaned back, rubbing her temples. The weight in her chest hadn't gone away- it just learned to hide under routine.

Then the phone rang.

She glanced at the screen-an unknown number. She stared at it, probably a spam, she told herself. Or someone from work. She nearly let it ring out–but something made her reach for it.

"Hello?"

Silence.

She almost hung up.

Then a voice called at the other end, familiar in a way that made her breath hitch and her heart ache.

"Elora."

For a second, She couldn't breathe. Her hand hovered, trembling. Years of silence, and now.this. Her heart pounded so hard she thought it might shatter.

Then she swallowed hard and answered.

"Lucian?"