Bitterly Sweetly (Completed)

Chapter Six : Memories And An Epiphany

A pang of discomfort hit in the middle of Max's chest the moment Sophia's eyes locked with his. The amount of pain there in her glare had the breath knocked out of his lungs. As she looked away from him, the smirk of victory on his lips dissolved and took the form of a tight line.

The hushed whispers of people around him as he successfully demonstrated a humiliating event for Sophia, it all dissipated to somewhere unknown.

He watched tears gather in the dull pool of her eyes, he watched the slight tremble of her lips as she scarcely contained the anguish standing there in silence and he watched how broken she looked.

He witnessed all that he had aimed to inflict upon her.

This was his revenge.

Something he'd been waiting for for so long.

But then, why couldn't he feel the happiness—the satisfaction of achieving what he desired!

A drop of tear that became too heavy to be pushed back was just about to roll down her one beautiful eye. But then, she whirled around, denying him from catching the destiny of that teardrop.

And then, Sophia was running.

His heart gave one unexpected squeeze as he watched her retreating back disappearing from his sight. The fading noise of her footsteps was supposed to provide him comfort considering they represented the defeat of his worst enemy. But enraging was the fact that it didn't.

Viv was a part of his plan. She had done her part too well along with her ever-giggling girlfriends just like he had instructed her to. But then, why now the background uproar of Viv and her friends' cackling in obvious triumph felt so oddly sick!

"So...," Max felt Viv's well-manicured fingers trailing on his shoulder suggestively as she inched closer to him and whispered in his ear, "Now that the filth is out of here, we can finally enjoy the party in a real sense. And then we can go to my place, or to yours, huh?"

Max merely gave Viv a slow smirk, his calm demeanor dissimilar to his inner state.

He discovered flabbergasted that humiliating Sophia, and taking his revenge on her did not change the constant prickling of incompleteness inside him.

He retired from the party soon, turning down Viv's offer to fill his night with seduction and pleasure.

Therefore, his night instead filled with continuous tossing and turning on the cold bed. He ended up throwing the covers first and then the pillow across his dark room. Finally giving up on achieving any sleep, he jumped out of bed in frustration.

Why was he not being able to sleep now that his mission was, at last, accomplished?

Max stood staring out the window of his room blankly, his arms stiffly crossed across his chest. With his eyes feeling slightly swollen underneath, he watched dawn break through the sky. As minutes ticked by, he heard Wilder Mansion waking up slowly. The servants loitered around the vast front lawn, the gardener had begun caring for the many plants—roses, hydrangeas, orchids of many colors and kinds and so on.

His father, Robert Wilder, walked out the steel bar gates for his morning jog.

Max sighed.

He was aware of his father's desire to hand over the law firm to him now that he had returned with a law degree. But that was not what Max wanted. He would rather take over one of their headquarters in London, in which he'd already worked for the last four years. Because if he stayed here in Asthel, it was inevitable that he would have to constantly cross paths with Sophia—the person he despised the most on the face of the earth.