Reclaiming Her Heart

Chapter 449 What About Her?

Selena understood the silence. For the next couple of hours, Raymond was consumed with work, his face buried in the glow of his laptop screen. She did the same, wrapping herself in the solitude of her own device, neither breaking the silence between them.

Two hours went by before a knock on the door signaled it was time to leave. Raymond snapped his laptop shut and was the first to stride out without so much as a glance towards Selena. She realized then that she hadn't been factored into his departure—she was left behind. But it didn't matter; she didn't want to accompany him anyway.

From inside, she could hear the cars rumble to life and faint voices questioning her absence. Raymond's response drifted through the door, "She's not feeling well." His response was misleading, deepened the misunderstanding. Selena remotely managed her company affairs, content to wait in the quiet for Raymond's return. But as the hours ticked by, there was no sign of his car. Dusk had settled, but it wasn't the normal dimming of day. It was as if a shadowy blanket had smothered the skies. Then it hit her-a sandstorm!

She rushed outside, only to find the villa nearly deserted except for a few clueless servants. When she tried calling Raymond, there was no answer, and concern gnawed at her. Without hesitation, she got into her car, driving towards one of the locations mentioned by the site manager.

Meanwhile, Raymond sat in the back of his car, oblivious to the ominous skies as he pored through documents. Derrick, the grim-faced site manager, urged the driver, Han, to speed up through the impending maelstrom. In a twist of fate, Selena's car just missed intersecting with theirs.

By the time Raymond reached the villa, the vehicles were crusted with a thick layer of sandy grit-an irritation that drove him immediately to the sanctuary of his room for a shower. But her absence made him furrow his brows in concern. "Where is she?" He demanded from the staff.

where you were headed and then returned to

string of missed calls were glaring back at him. He phoned her back, anxiety in his tone when she

small, desolate house they had mentioned. She was surrounded by darkness, with no key and no way to get inside. The sandstorm raged, forcing

you?" He struggled to maintain

fit of coughing, Selena didn't immediately reveal her location but instead sighed in relief. Something about the storm made her realize what mattered most. "Good to hear you

moments ago, the foreman had warned that the dust storm brewing was fiercer than the one from a decade ago, capable of toppling trees. If she were outside right

was startled by Raymond's use of profanity and hurried to reply. "I'm

had been earlier. It was a vast expanse of beach stretching out of

past storm, and they had just stopped by it that afternoon. It was compact, no more than five hundred square feet, but meticulously clean. Yet Selena didn't have the keys. If she took shelter at the Sandbar now, she'd be out in the open

his

gearing up to drive off. "Mr. Montague, you

too risky; the car