Chapter Forty-One - Sebastian

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Chapter Forty-One

The conversation had gone better than expected. Her mother had been deliriously happy, and her father had seemed glad as well, though he'd shocked Isla by hinting that she keep in Arturo's good books in order to get the rest of the company back, or more of it so that the King family would be considered the main owners and have more control.

Forty-nine percent to fifty-one still meant that Arturo had all the power over the company.

There was no word yet from her grandfather, though Isla's mother had insisted that he was happy. Isla kind of thought he was pissed off and too proud over the entire thing.

He'd eventually come around.

She hoped.

Two weeks later, she told her parents that she and Arturo had a falling out. Her mother had bee saddened, and her father had been worried that Arturo would take back the nearly fifty percent of the company that he'd given her.

Isla had to assure him that the breakup hadn't been that bad.

And it hadn't been. Not really. Isla even slowly started to sketch out her jewelry designs and put together her pieces for sale on the floor of one of the main shops.

Isla hadn't expected to feel the level of refreshing relief that had washed over when she'd walked through the doors of Baciami Boutique for the first time in years.

Maybe it had just been the air conditioning, but Isla felt like she'd come home when she walked in. Her mother had nearly cried, and her dad kept looking around at the walls and nodding.

Isla's brother Matt had even told her that the fighting had slowed down, though there were still messages from divorce lawyers on the phone.

Isla had been stupid and childish to think that getting this place back would stop her parents from separating. A business wouldn't undo all the stress and anger brought on by years of fighting.

At least they were being civil again. If they did divorce, then at least they could work at being friends.

And fine, she was still holding out hope for their marriage, but the point was that things weren't as gloomy as they'd been at the start of all of this.

Isla was able to laugh and joke with the staff as she set up her jewelry and folded lacy panties and lingerie on polished wooden tables.

Business was booming again, and even her grandfather stopped being so bitter about only owning forty-nine percent of his baby.

He was coming around, it seemed.

Isla had been sitting at her favorite café, enjoying a ridiculously expensive ice coffee while sketching out more designs for her jewelry brand when a body plopped into the seat across from her.

She jumped. Sebastian was sitting right across from her in the trendy little chair on the other side of her circular glass table.

Isla looked around. She didn't see Orlando or Silvio, and no one else sitting around her seemed to think that anything was out of place.

She didn't know why looking at him would make her think that Arturo was around, because he was clearly nowhere to be found.

She'd thought she was over him, but apparently not.

"I can see my presence here bothers you."

Isla flipped shut her sketchbook and collected her coloured pencils. "It's a free country. You can sit wherever you want."

"Uh huh, look, I wanted to talk to you," Sebastian said, leaning over the tiny table, his hands clenched together. "You don't have to sit around if you don't want, but I just had something to say to you."

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