Bye Loser! Love, Daddy's Heiress - Chapter 16: Chapter 16

My breath hitched.
He staggered backward, face contorted in shock and pain. His gaze dropped to the blood blooming across his shirt before snapping back to me. I blinked rapidly. No. This wasn't how it was supposed to go.
Lotharo's knees gave out. He crumpled to the floor, choking on ragged breaths. Pearl stood frozen—her perfect mask slipping for the first time, replaced by something dangerously close to horror.
No no no this wasn't—
Strong arms locked around me. Taurus.
I thrashed, screaming raw against his hold. "Let me go! Goddamn it, let me go!"
His grip was unbreakable. Security flooded in, voices shouting over each other, hands grabbing at me. I didn't even realize I was laughing until the sound hit my ears—high-pitched, fractured, bordering on unhinged.
My eyes found Pearl kneeling beside Lothario, pressing her palms to his wound like she could will the blood back inside him.
"You love him," I whispered, voice trembling with hysterical laughter. "After everything... you still love him."
Pearl's head jerked up, her expression icy and unreadable. Then—
"Taurus," she said, each word sharp enough to draw blood, "get her out of my sight."
Darkness swallowed me as they dragged me away, my screams bouncing off the warehouse walls. Pearl had won.
PEARL'S POV
Lothario survived. Of course he did. Some part of me had known the second that knife sank into his side that he wouldn't die. The bastard was too stubborn, too convinced of his own invincibility after a lifetime of skating through consequences.
But now, lying in that hospital bed—pale, hooked to machines, weak—he looked painfully mortal.
I stepped inside, heels clicking against sterile tiles. The antiseptic sting of the air mixed with the heavy silence.
Lothario turned his head. When his exhausted eyes met mine, something flickered in them—something raw and unfamiliar. Regret.
"Pearl," he rasped, voice scraped raw like he'd been calling for me for hours.
I lingered by the door, arms crossed. "Lothario."
He swallowed hard, wincing as he tried pushing himself up. "You came."
I tilted my head, unimpressed. "Don't flatter yourself."
A weak chuckle escaped him. "Still got that razor tongue, I see."
He must've sensed I wasn't here for small talk, because the humor died fast. "Pearl..."
A bitter smile curled my lips. "Funny. You had years to talk. Years to listen. Never seemed interested before."
He dragged a hand down his stubbled face. "I'm sorry... for everything."
A cold laugh slipped out. "That's the understatement of the century."
His jaw clenched. "I—" He hesitated, then met my gaze head-on. "I should've never let you go."
I arched a brow. "Let me go?"
His throat worked. "You know what I—"
"Don't." My voice could've cut glass. "You didn't let me go, Lothario. You threw me away. Tossed me aside the second I stopped being useful."
His fists bunched in the sheets. "I was an idiot."
"Agreed," I said breezily.
The silence between us thickened.
Then, barely audible: "I loved you."
Ice spread through my veins.
"No," I said, utterly toneless. "You didn't."
His eyes flashed. "I did—"
"You needed me," I corrected, stepping closer so he could see the frost in my gaze. "Needed me to clean up your messes, to prop up your ego, to bleed myself dry for your ambitions. But love? If you'd loved me, you wouldn't have spent years making me feel like furniture after the money started rolling in."
He flinched. Good.
"Do you even know my birthday?" Silence.
"Remember my favorite flower?" More silence.
A humorless laugh escaped me. "Remember when your biggest investor pulled out? When you were sobbing about bankruptcy?" I leaned in. "Who groveled to keep them? Who brought in three new backers while you were too busy drowning in self-pity?"
His face went ashen.
"Or when your CFO was embezzling? Who uncovered it? Who handled it while you were off chasing Alessia?" My smile turned knife-sharp. "You never noticed, did you? Because I wasn't a person to you. Just a convenience. Until I wasn't."
Lothario's breathing turned ragged.
I leaned closer, voice dropping to a lethal whisper: "You made your bed, darling. Now lie in it."
He swallowed hard. "Pearl, I—"
"I forgive you," I cut in.
He froze. "You... do?"
I nodded. "But forgiveness isn't love. It isn't a second chance."
His entire body locked up.
"I only came to thank you," I said, turning toward the door. "For taking that knife."
"Pearl—please—"
I didn't stop. Didn't look back.
I walked out and didn't spare him another thought.
Taurus Sullivan was relentless. He didn't flirt—he pursued. With the confidence of a man who knew his own worth, the patience of a saint, and a devotion that unnerved me more than any grand gesture ever could.
"I'm not him," he told me one night on my penthouse balcony, the city sprawled below us like scattered jewels. "I don't want to own you, Pearl. I just want to stand beside you."
I sipped my wine, eyeing him sidelong. "Pretty speech."
His smirk was all confidence. "Every word true."
I searched his face—for tells, for cracks, for the usual male bravado masking insecurity. Found none.
Just warmth. Strength. A man who didn't need me... but wanted me anyway. And for the first time in years, I let myself exhale.
Lothario's empire crumbled. Stocks tanked. Investors fled. I could've buried him with one phone call.
I didn't.
Let him claw his way back up alone for once. No rescues. No shortcuts.
Not mercy. Not revenge.
Just balance.
Because I'd moved on.
And now? It was his turn.