Chapter 296: I Am Free, and You Are Relieved
The word "breakup" struck Sean Sterling like a bolt of lightning. He froze on the spot, his mind went blank, and the world began to spin. It felt like his entire sky had collapsed.
His pupils contracted violently, the color draining from his eyes. A ringing filled his ears, and he could barely believe what he had just heard.
Isla Griffith wanted to break up with him.
She didn’t want him anymore.
An immense panic, like an icy tide, completely engulfed him.
Almost instinctively, Sean Sterling reached out, carefully pulling Isla Griffith into his arms. His touch was so light it was almost reverent, as if he were afraid that the slightest pressure would shatter her already fragile body.
"Isla Griffith, do you have any idea what you’re saying!"
His voice trembled, laced with suppressed agony and panic.
"Our baby is gone. I’m in more pain than anyone, and now you want to break up with me? Why? Just tell me why."
Isla Griffith didn’t respond. She neither struggled nor leaned into his embrace, simply letting Sean Sterling hold her quietly.
But the tears in her eyes welled up faster, sliding silently down her cheeks.
Receiving no response, Sean Sterling grew even more panicked.
A sense of unease coiled around his heart like a vine, tightening its grip until he could barely breathe.
He turned his head to the side, looking at Wren Sutton, whose eyes were red as she fought back her anger. He pleaded with her urgently.
"Wren, you must know what happened. Please, tell me, what’s going on?"
"I can’t just lose my baby and then my wife without understanding why."
Wren Sutton was taken aback. Her heart ached with a sour bitterness.
’She wanted to know what happened, too.’
But from the moment she called for help to when she woke up, Isla Griffith hadn’t said a single word about what had transpired.
All Wren Sutton knew was that it was a sudden hemorrhage, a miscarriage caused by extreme emotional distress.
But as for who or what had pushed Isla Griffith to this point, she was completely in the dark.
"I want to know the answer too!"
"By the time I got the call and rushed over, Isla had already been wheeled into the operating room. She only just woke up a few minutes before you burst in."
"Just like you, I have no idea who upset her, causing her to miscarry and lose her baby."
In that instant, Sean Sterling’s heart plunged into a bottomless abyss.
A bone-chilling panic seized him, gripping every inch of his body.
"Even you don’t know..."
The usually gentle Wren Sutton had never lost her temper with Sean Sterling, never even said a harsh word to him. But today was an exception.
"Sean Sterling, let me ask you, is this how you take care of Isla?"
"She was pregnant, at her most vulnerable and helpless. Why couldn’t you make more time to be with her? How could you dare to leave her at home alone with just a nanny? You’ve got some nerve."
"Isla has never received an ounce of respect from your family. She was under so much pressure, dealing with so many grievances, all while carrying your child. Do you have any idea how hard it’s been for her?"
"If she didn’t love you so much, why would she have pushed herself this far? Why would she have endured so much suffering?"
"You say you love her, over and over again, but is this how you show it? When she was in agony and despair, needing someone to protect her, where were you!"
As Wren Sutton spoke, tears began to fall again. She truly ached for her best friend.
Sean Sterling’s heart ached just as much.
Guilt and self-blame reddened his eyes. The man who was always so tough and severe also shed tears.
He slowly turned his head back, his gaze falling on Isla Griffith’s face—so pale it was almost translucent, so deathly still it held no trace of life. His heart felt as if it were being squeezed by a ruthless hand, the pain making it impossible to breathe.
Sean Sterling leaned down, gently pressing his forehead against the back of her cold hand.
"I’m sorry. It’s all my fault. I’m the one who hurt you."
His voice was hoarse, every word laced with a bleeding remorse.
"I shouldn’t have left you at home alone. I shouldn’t have focused all my energy on work, neglecting you and the baby, neglecting all the grievances you were suffering."
"I’m sorry, Isla, I was wrong. You can yell at me, hit me, punish me however you want. Just don’t say you want to break up. Please, don’t leave me."
"Our baby is gone. I’m already going crazy. I can’t lose you too. If I do, I won’t be able to live for a single day."
Isla Griffith slowly closed her eyes, her long lashes matted with tears.
Using all the strength she had left, she slowly, bit by bit, pulled her hand from Sean Sterling’s grasp.
The movement was so light it was almost weightless, yet it carried a heartbreaking and resolute detachment.
"There is no why."
Her voice was flat, without a ripple of emotion.
"The baby is gone, and my heart died with it. There’s nothing tying us together anymore."
"Sean Sterling, you’re free, and I’m liberated."
"For the sake of what we once had, let me go, and let yourself go, too."
"From now on, we’ll make a clean break and have nothing to do with each other."
Those words exhausted all of Isla Griffith’s mental and emotional energy.
After speaking, she turned away, utterly spent in body and soul, leaving Sean Sterling with nothing but the sight of her thin, fragile back.
Her body was curled slightly, like a small, cornered animal covered in wounds, wanting only to hide in an unseen corner and lick its deep, incurable wounds alone.
Sean Sterling remained kneeling on the floor, his body rigid, as if his blood had frozen solid in that moment.
He stared at her resolute back, at her shoulders that trembled slightly but refused to turn, and his heart was brutally torn apart, inch by inch, by endless pain, confusion, regret, and helplessness.
’He still didn’t know the truth.’
’He didn’t know what kind of soul-crushing torment the woman he loved had endured where he couldn’t see.’
’He only knew that he had lost his child and was about to lose her, too.’
Overwhelming despair instantly drowned Sean Sterling.
He couldn’t hold on any longer. He collapsed against the side of the bed, his shoulders wracked with violent tremors.
A long-suppressed sob broke from his throat, and he cried like a lost, helpless child.
"No, I don’t want to be apart from you."
"We promised. We promised we’d be together forever."
"Isla, please, just give me a little more time. I will get to the bottom of this. I will give you an explanation, and I won’t let you suffer this injustice for nothing."
On the hospital bed, Isla Griffith lay motionless. Only silent tears streamed endlessly down her cheeks.
They washed away all her love, her expectations, and her hopes for the future.
And they buried the passionate, shattered love she shared with Sean Sterling.
「An unknown amount of time passed.」
"Sean Sterling, get out."
Isla Griffith’s voice broke the silence of the hospital room.
"I want to rest in peace. I don’t want to hear any sounds, and I don’t want to see anyone."
She still had her back to Sean Sterling, showing no intention of turning around, not leaving him even the slightest room for reconciliation.
Sean Sterling’s knees, which had been on the floor for so long, were numb. The tearing pain in his chest spread through his entire body, every fiber of his being screaming with reluctance and anguish.
He opened his mouth, wanting to say more—to plead, to apologize, to take her hand again.
But facing that back, so resolute it was devoid of any warmth, all his words caught in his throat, turning into scalding tears of blood.
’He knew that Isla Griffith was truly tired, truly hurt to the core. She didn’t want to look at him, nor did she want to hear his voice.’
A moment later, Sean Sterling pushed himself up from the floor, his movements slow and heavy.
He took one last, deep look at the curled figure on the bed.
That one look contained all his regret, pain, and unwillingness to let go.
It also concealed the bone-chilling hostility that was suddenly surging in his heart.
"Fine, I’ll go..." Sean Sterling’s voice was hoarse and broken. "Isla, get some rest. I won’t bother you. But I will never leave you. This isn’t over. You wait for me."
With that, he turned and walked toward the door.
With a soft CLICK, the hospital room door was gently closed.
The moment the door shut, all the vulnerability and pain vanished from Sean Sterling, replaced by an iciness that could freeze anything.
He leaned against the cold wall. The redness in his eyes was gone, leaving only a dark, thick malevolence and ruthlessness that couldn’t be dissolved.
The humble, weeping, helpless, and regretful man who had just been in front of Isla Griffith vanished without a trace. In his place stood the decisive, ruthless, and intimidating eldest son of the Sterling Family, a man renowned in the business world.
His knuckles turned white from the force of his grip, the joints cracking. The hand at his side was clenched into a tight fist, knuckles protruding and veins bulging. A world-destroying fury and killing intent roiled in his eyes.
’The baby was gone. Isla was so hurt her heart had turned to ash, and she even wanted to break up with him.’
’And even now, he had no idea who had hurt her, who had driven her to miscarry.’
The thought of the unknown harm Isla Griffith had suffered while home alone, the image of her pregnant, helpless, and losing their child—it was as if Sean Sterling’s heart was being repeatedly scorched by fire and then brutally frozen by ice.
He straightened up, the pressure around him dropping to an extreme low. Nurses passing in the hallway felt the terrifying chill and subconsciously gave him a wide berth, not daring to get close.
Sean Sterling took out his phone, his fingertips ice-cold, and dialed his assistant.
"Mobilize every resource immediately. I want a full investigation into Isla Griffith’s whereabouts before her miscarriage, including everyone she came into contact with and her phone call records."
A bloodthirsty glint flashed in his eyes, his tone so cold and ruthless it was terrifying.
"I don’t care who it is. I’m going to make them pay."