A MILLIONAIRE ENTERS A RESTAURANT… AND IS STUNNED BY THE SIGHT OF HIS PREGNANT EX-WIFE SERVING TABLES

“I hope I never see your face again,” Isabella said, her voice trembling but her gaze steady as she slid the divorce papers across the polished mahogany of his desk.

Sebastian Montgomery merely arched an eyebrow, a cold smirk playing on his lips. “The feeling is mutual. One less distraction.”

Three years later, he walked into Aura, Manhattan’s most exclusive restaurant, and saw a ghost.

The black Bentley Mulsanne purred to a stop before the grand entrance of Aura, a temple of modern gastronomy tucked away in a quiet Upper East Side street. Sebastian “Seb” Montgomery adjusted the cuff of his Brioni suit, the platinum sheen of his Patek Philippe watch catching the evening light. At thirty-eight, he wasn’t just successful; he was a titan, the CEO of Montgomery Holdings, a luxury hotel empire with a net worth teetering on a billion dollars.

“Good evening, Mr. Montgomery,” the valet said, his deference bordering on worship. Seb gave a curt, practiced nod—the kind perfected in boardrooms where fortunes were made and lost on a single word.

Tonight was a victory lap. He’d just finalized the hostile takeover of a rival chain, a move that would cement his dominance on the East Coast. His date for the evening was Chloe Vance, a 25-year-old runway model whose admiration for his Amex Black card was refreshingly transparent. She was beautiful, uncomplicated, and temporary—exactly his type.

The interior of Aura was a symphony of understated wealth. Original Rothko paintings adorned the walls, and the air was scented with Japanese cherry blossoms flown in daily. A single dinner here could cost more than the average American’s monthly mortgage payment.

“Mr. Montgomery,” the maître d’ greeted him with a silken smile. “Your table is ready. Miss Vance is expected shortly.”

“Excellent,” Seb replied, his voice a low baritone accustomed to command.

As he was led to his secluded corner table with its panoramic view of the city skyline, a wave of satisfaction washed over him. Three years since the divorce. Three years of relentless, glorious acquisition. He’d dated starlets and heiresses, conquered markets, and built an empire. Isabella had been a footnote, a lesson learned about the foolishness of mixing sentiment with ambition.

He settled into the plush leather chair, the city lights glittering below like a carpet of diamonds he had personally laid.

“The wine list, sir?” a young waiter inquired.

“No need. The ’98 Pétrus. Chilled to precisely sixty-four degrees,” he ordered without looking up, already engrossed in his phone. A text from Chloe: Traffic is a nightmare! Be there in 15. xoxo. Perfect. Time to review the quarterly reports from his London office.

As he was scanning profit margins, a figure approached with the wine. He glanced up by reflex, his mind on the vintage. And then, the world stopped turning.

His phone slipped from his grasp, clattering onto the marble floor. The sound was like a gunshot in the sudden, roaring silence of his mind.

Isabella.

It was Isabella Rossi, his ex-wife, standing before him. She wore the restaurant’s simple uniform—a crisp white shirt and black skirt—with an apron that couldn’t hide the impossible truth.

She was pregnant. Very pregnant, the swell of her belly prominent and round, suggesting she was deep into her third trimester. Her face, which he remembered as soft and radiant, was now etched with a fine latticework of exhaustion. Her lustrous auburn hair, once styled weekly at Bergdorf’s, was pulled back in a simple, functional ponytail.

But it was her eyes that undid him. The same emerald eyes that had once gazed at him with fierce, unconditional love now held a shattered mix of shock, humiliation, and raw, animal panic.

“Will you be tasting the wine, sir?” she asked, her voice a strained whisper that fought to maintain its professional veneer.

Seb was paralyzed. His brain, an instrument finely tuned to process billion-dollar deals in seconds, had simply short-circuited. Isabella. His Isabella, the woman he had surgically removed from his life, was here. Pregnant. Serving tables for tips in a place where he spent her old weekly allowance on a single bottle of wine.

A tidal wave of memories crashed over him. Isabella, laughing on their honeymoon in Tuscany. Isabella, humming softly in their penthouse kitchen as she made his coffee just the way he liked it. Isabella, her face wet with tears that final, terrible night, begging him to reconsider, to start the family she so desperately wanted.

“A child is a liability, Isabella,” he had said, his voice like ice. “My focus is the company. If you can’t accept that, you are not the right partner for my ascent.”

And now here she was, carrying the child he had denied her, working on her feet in a place where a single tip might be all she had for groceries.

“Sir?” she repeated, her voice cracking as she noticed other patrons beginning to stare.

He tried to form a word, any word, but his throat was a knot of concrete. How? After the divorce, he’d cut her a check. Fifty thousand dollars. It had felt generous at the time—severance pay, he’d thought of it. What had happened to it? And who… who was the father?