Let Me Go, Mr. Howard Chapter 20

Scarlett froze.

She stared at the glass shards scattered across the floor, at the severed wires, at what once symbolized the soul of "Starlight"—now reduced to nothing but ruins. 

Her blood, sweat, and tears. Her persistence. All destroyed in an instant.

When Sebastian arrived, this was the scene that greeted him: glass fragments and torn papers everywhere, the star installation dismantled and broken, and Scarlett crouched on the floor, mechanically picking up pieces of glass one by one. 

Her fingertips were bleeding, blood dripping onto the shards below, yet she seemed completely unaware, just robotically gathering pieces, her eyes vacant.

"Seb!" Edith immediately rushed over, throwing herself into Sebastian's arms with dramatic sobs. 

"Thank god you're here! Scarlett went crazy! She wouldn't let the workers take down the installation and started fighting with them. Then everything collapsed! Look at all this glass—it's terrifying!"

Sebastian's gaze fell on Scarlett, cold as ice, more cutting than the glass shards on the floor. He pushed Edith aside and walked step by step toward Scarlett, bending down to grip the wrist of her glass-collecting hand.

"Enough." His voice was colder than she'd ever heard it, carrying an almost cruel detachment.

Scarlett looked up, her eyes rimmed red. His grip was painfully tight, and her blood smeared onto his pristine white shirt. 

"Sebastian..." She opened her mouth to speak, but found her throat blocked, unable to push out a single word.

Sebastian didn't look at her injured hand or at the devastated ruins around them. He simply used a tone that was practically an order to tell his bodyguards, "Take her away."

Two security men immediately stepped forward to escort Scarlett out. She froze for a moment, then let out a soft laugh. "No need. I can walk myself out."

Using her uninjured hand for support, she slowly rose to her feet. Her movements were sluggish but remarkably steady.

 Only when fully upright did she lift her eyes to Sebastian. That gaze was utterly still, like a dead pond—as if she were looking at a stranger, a passerby with no connection to her life.

Sebastian's brow furrowed slightly under her stare, his Adam's apple unconsciously bobbing once. 

Edith continued whimpering beside him, "Seb, just look at her..."

But Scarlett no longer acknowledged anyone. Her gaze shifted from Sebastian's face, swept across the mess on the floor, passed over Edith's smug expression, and then—she turned and walked away, one step at a time.

For the next few days, Sebastian didn't come looking for her. He only sent Mark once, whom she managed to avoid. He seemed to be punishing her with silence, deliberately giving her the cold shoulder. 

Scarlett was actually relieved to be left alone.

Three evenings before the Starlight Show, the design department office was nearly empty. 

Scarlett hunched over her desk piled with documents, her fingertips repeatedly tracing the approval contract folder. 

It should have contained the most important approval documents for the Starlight Show—venue permits, fire safety clearances, and cultural department certifications. But now, the folder was empty.

"Ms. Seymour, we've got the security footage," Patty rushed over with her laptop. The screen showed slightly blurry footage of Edith's assistant sneaking into the office during lunch break when few people were around, stuffing the folder into her bag.

Scarlett's nails dug sharply into her palm. Edith. Again.

She practically sprinted out of the company. The evening wind rushed through her thin blouse, making her shiver. 

When her taxi reached the Seymour Villa, warm yellow light illuminated the living room. 

Edith sat at her vanity wearing a champagne-colored nightgown, trying on a wedding veil. Tiny pearls adorned the veil, gently swaying with her movements like strung moonlight.

"Well, what a rare visitor." Edith glanced at Scarlett in the mirror, her lips curling into a mocking smile.

"Where are my approval contracts?" Scarlett's voice was ice cold, her gaze fixed on Edith. "Tell your assistant to hand them over."

"Approval contracts?" Edith raised her eyebrows in feigned surprise, fingering the tassels of her veil. "Oh, those. They were cluttering up the desk, and they weren't useful anyway, so I had them thrown out."

"Thrown out?" Scarlett trembled with anger, her voice shaking. "Do you have any idea how important those are? Without those contracts, the Starlight Show can't happen! I made seven trips to government offices and collected over a dozen official stamps to get those!"

"I know." Edith turned around, unhurriedly removing her veil and placing it in her jewelry box. "That's why I told Seb we should just cancel the show. Nobody's looking forward to it anyway. No point in you wasting your energy." 

She waved her phone, showing her chat with Sebastian. His most recent reply simply read: [Whatever you think best.]

Scarlett understood then. Edith knew exactly how important those approval contracts were. This was deliberate. She knew how much the Starlight Show meant to Scarlett, which is why she'd methodically destroyed it.

"Edith, what do you actually want?" Scarlett's voice quivered with rage. "You've already ruined my designs, switched my fabrics, dismantled my installation—isn't that enough?"

"Not nearly enough." Edith stood up and walked toward her step by step, her nightgown sweeping across the carpet, leaving behind a faint trace of perfume. 

"I want to watch you hop around like a pathetic clown for a show that's doomed to fail. I want you to know that all your hard work means less than trash to me."

She leaned close to Scarlett's ear, her voice soft as a sigh but carrying the most venomous curse, "You wanted your designs to shine? I'll make sure they rot in the mud instead."

The sky had completely darkened by the time Scarlett left the Seymour Villa. 

Standing at the roadside, looking at the warm yellow light in the villa, she suddenly felt a burning sensation in her eyes. 

She immediately took a taxi back to the company and searched every corner. The mountains of design portfolios were turned upside down, boxes of fabric were torn open, even the waste bin in the corner was overturned, paper scraps scattered everywhere.

Finally, at the bottom of an old trash can, she found a crumpled piece of paper—a draft of the approval contract, just a corner of it, with her handwritten note "URGENT" still visible. 

Her fingertips traced over those words, the rough paper edge scraping her skin.

Scarlett sat amidst the chaos, took out her phone, and after hesitating for a long time, sent Sebastian a message: [Edith threw away the approval contracts. Is there any way we could get new ones? The Starlight Show opens in three days.]

The moment she hit send, she suddenly felt ridiculous. 

What was she expecting? That Sebastian would help her? That he would take her side? Hadn't countless past lessons taught her better? 

Yet she still clung to that faint hope, staring at her phone screen until it went dark, then lighting it up again, over and over.