Chapter 4 – The Empty House

The dressing room door closed with a sharp click.

Sofía Rojas didn’t look back.

She crossed the hallway as if she no longer needed permission, her steps firm, deliberate. The ball gown still clung to her body, but it no longer held her. It was an empty shell—just like her marriage.

When she reached the bedroom, she slipped off her shoes and placed them neatly at the foot of the bed. Not out of nostalgia. Out of respect for herself.

The cold floor bit into her feet. She didn’t flinch. Cold for cold—this house had never offered her warmth.

She didn’t cry. She simply breathed. And with that breath came a certainty she could no longer deny: she was leaving, and this time, she wasn’t coming back.

She turned on the desk lamp. Her shadow stretched along the walls, as if she were abandoning not just a home, but a version of herself she no longer wished to carry.

She opened the drawer and pulled out a black folder.

Untouched.

The marriage contract.

Two copies. Two signatures. Hundreds of unwritten silences.

“This agreement will remain valid as long as it benefits both parties.”

She read the line out loud. It no longer hurt. It only confirmed her decision.

She walked to the closet, took out her brown leather suitcase, and placed it on the bed. She wasn’t running away—this was an act of freedom.

Three changes of clothes.

A doctor’s coat.

Her journal.

Two pairs of comfortable shoes.

Her surgical glasses case and her laptop.

And one photograph.

Her as a child, smiling beside Isabel Castell—Adrián’s mother.

The only genuine smile in that house.

The only memory worth keeping.

She opened the safe and removed her passport, documents, and a copy of her thesis.

She caressed it softly. That thesis wasn’t just a professional achievement—it was a promise fulfilled. Her legacy.

She sat down and took a sheet of paper.

A sudden wave of dizziness made her sway, but she steadied herself almost instantly.

She wrote:

Adrián:

Our contract has expired.

I am releasing you so you may fulfill your true obligations.

Sofía.

She removed her ring and placed it on top of the contract.

A goodbye without drama. Just truth.

She turned off the light. Crossed the hallway. Opened the door.

She closed it gently behind her and left.

Without looking back.

5:48 a.m.

The electronic lock emitted a dull beep as Adrián Castell entered the house, his shoulders slumped, his jacket draped over one arm, his phone turned off, his shirt wrinkled.

He was coming straight from the hospital, where Valeria lay asleep under sedation.

Could it really be that serious?

Maybe. Maybe not, he thought, running a hand through his disheveled hair, frustration knotting his chest.

He collapsed into the armchair and rubbed his exhausted face.

Images flickered through his mind: the gala, Valeria’s fainting, the chaos, the camera flashes… and Sofía.

Brief. Distant. Unsettling.

Is she home?

He hadn’t asked earlier. Hadn’t even thought about it. Valeria’s crisis had consumed him.

Until now.

He stood and walked toward the desk to set down the watch Sofía had given him on their second wedding anniversary.

That’s when he saw it.

The contract.

The note.

The ring.

Everything arranged with surgical precision.

Like a clean incision.

He picked up the paper and read it out loud.

“Our contract has expired.”

He frowned—and for a fleeting second, he felt relief. As if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders.

But it vanished almost immediately.

A hollow ache filled his chest. An unfamiliar emptiness. As if something he had never learned to care for had been taken from him.

He picked up the ring.

Turned it between his fingers.

No stones. No engraving.

Just a simple white gold band.

Like her.

Like the way she loved him.

His mind drifted to Valeria’s extravagant rings—always gleaming, always on display.

Sofía had never asked for anything.

She had only looked at him with honest eyes.

She had only taken care of him.

And he hadn’t seen it.

He dialed her number. In his phone, her contact was saved as WIFE.

An automated voice answered:

“The number you are trying to reach is turned off or out of service.”

He tried again.

Nothing.

He went upstairs and opened the closet.

Her clothes were gone. Her shoes. The suitcase. The safe stood open and empty.

In the bathroom, her toothbrush was missing. Her perfume. Her white robe.

The house no longer smelled like Sofía.

It didn’t smell like anything at all.

And that was the worst part.

He went to the office, searching for her planner. It wasn’t there. On impulse, he called the hospital.

“I need to speak with Dr. Sofía Rojas. This is Adrián Castell… her husband.”

“Mr. Castell,” the receptionist replied calmly, “the doctor requested personal leave last night. She specifically asked not to be contacted.”

“Where is she?”

“I’m sorry. That information is confidential.”

He hung up and stood alone in the middle of the office.

The contract on the desk.

The ring in his hand.

And the certainty that everything he had ignored for so long… was gone.

The ring triggered a memory.

Sofía stitching a wound on his arm after a riding accident.

“Does it hurt?” she had asked.

He had shaken his head—even as he squeezed her hand hard enough to leave marks.

Now, that same hand was trembling.

Instinctively, he brought his fingers to his nose, searching for the scent of her lavender shampoo.

It was gone.

He closed his eyes.

For the first time, he didn’t think about Valeria.

Not her health.

Not her fragility.

He thought of Sofía.

Not as his wife.

Not as an obligation.

But as she truly was.

A woman who loved him without conditions.

Who stood beside him without applause.

A woman who had left him.

Not because she didn’t love him—

But because she finally learned to love herself more than him.