Rebirth: A Second chance at life-Chapter 137: The tastiest food....

The information the old couple had given was vague. Fragmented. Half-formed confessions stitched together by fear.

But it was enough.

It suited the silhouette of someone Luna already suspected.

She stood near the window of the forest villa, arms folded, eyes distant yet razor sharp. The night outside was silent, but her thoughts were not.

"It’s beginning to make sense," she murmured.

Bishop waited quietly.

She exhaled slowly.

"So that’s how it was."

Both she and her sister had never been accidents. Never misfortunes of fate. They had been moved. Positioned. Placed.

She had been abandoned to an orphanage.

Aurora had been taken in—by Lily.

Her lips curved, though there was no warmth in it.

"We were pawns," she said quietly. "Someone else’s pieces on the board."

Her mind replayed the timeline again. The convenient transfers. The erased trails. The financial shadows. The way Lily appeared at just the right time.

Too deliberate.

Too clean.

"I’ll make Lily talk," Luna said softly. "She’ll spill every detail."

But she stopped herself.

Not yet.

If she moved too fast, whoever stood behind this carefully constructed game would notice. They would erase evidence. They would shift the chessboard again.

And Luna did not like being one step behind.

"First," she said calmly, "I restore Aurora’s name."

Her eyes darkened with resolve.

"I’ll get her degree certificates. I’ll rebuild her credentials. Let the world see she was never a fool."

Justice, sometimes, was not about revenge.

Sometimes it was about recognition.

Later that evening, Luna returned to her cliffside villa.

The ocean roared below, waves crashing against black rock. The air smelled of salt and wind. Normally, that view steadied her.

Tonight, her mind remained restless.

She had planned to cook something simple — something comforting — for herself and Jenny. The child had become a rare softness in her life. Luna loved her fiercely, though she rarely admitted it aloud.

"Where is Jenny?" she asked the maid casually upon entering.

"She left with Mr. Harper, madam."

Luna paused slightly.

"With Sebastian?"

"Yes."

She nodded once.

She was about to head upstairs when her phone vibrated.

A message.

From Sebastian.

Dinner. Join us.

Her brows lifted faintly.

She began typing a refusal.

Before she could send it, another message arrived.

Jenny would be happy if you came. Consider it repayment for your help earlier.

A faint smile touched her lips.

He knew her well enough to anticipate rejection.

She sighed.

"For Jenny," she murmured.

Because the truth was — being around that child quieted something inside her.

She dressed deliberately.

A black V-neck bodycon dress. Elegant. Controlled. Effortlessly commanding. Her hair fell naturally over her shoulders, framing a face that carried both calm and danger.

When she arrived at the private dining room, she paused briefly at the doorway.

Jenny sat absorbed in her iPad, small legs swinging. Sebastian sat across from her, reviewing documents with quiet intensity.

The atmosphere between them was cool, almost detached.

If Luna hadn’t done her research, she might have mistaken them for father and daughter.

The resemblance between Sebastian and Jenny was striking — not only in their features, but in their mannerisms.

The same calm authority in their posture. The same measured way of speaking. Even their silences felt identical.

They moved in quiet sync, as though one had learned directly from the other.

It didn’t feel like siblings.

It felt like inheritance.

She and Aurora had looked the same too.

The same eyes, the same delicate curve of their lips, the same face that could confuse anyone at first glance. Yet inside, they had been opposites.

Aurora had been light where Luna was shadow. Gentle where Luna was unyielding.

Watching Sebastian and Jenny stand side by side, so aligned in habit and temperament, a fleeting thought brushed against her mind.

If she and Aurora had grown up together under the same roof... would they have become like that?

Would their differences have softened into similarities?

Would they have shared the same gestures, the same tone, the same quiet understanding?

The thought lingered for only a second.

Then Luna looked away.

The door opened fully.

Jenny looked up first.

Her face lit instantly.

"Big sis!"

She jumped down and ran toward Luna, wrapping her arms around her leg.

Luna softened almost imperceptibly.

"I came," she said gently.

She sat beside Jenny, deliberately ignoring Sebastian’s intense gaze at first.

She adjusted her posture with calm precision, smoothing the fabric of her dress as though the weight of his stare did not exist.

Only after settling did she look up, offering a small, controlled smile.

Sebastian had been stunned the moment she entered. T

he sight of Aurora had caught him completely off guard — her beauty striking enough to silence even his composed mind.

He had meant to look away, meant to regain control of himself.

But he didn’t.

His eyes remained on her, openly, almost helplessly.

Aurora knew it.

She could feel the steadiness of his gaze without even meeting it.

Yet she chose to ignore him, as though he were merely part of the room’s background.

And Sebastian, carried away by the quiet pull of her presence, forgot — for several long seconds — that he was supposed to look elsewhere.

"Good evening, Mr. Harper."

Sebastian blinked, as though pulled from deep thought.

"Good evening, Ms. Smith."

His tone was steady.

But his ears were faintly red.

Interesting.

"I hope I’m not late," she said.

"You’re on time."

Food was served shortly after.

Luna ate with quiet appreciation. She genuinely enjoyed good cuisine.

Jenny, meanwhile, piled food onto her plate enthusiastically, completely absorbed in her task.

"You need to eat more! You’ve become a lot skinnier these past few days," she said between bites, glancing at Luna with exaggerated concern.

Then Jenny turned toward Sebastian. "You should serve Big Sis too!"

"That’s not necessary," Luna began calmly—

But Sebastian had already picked up a shrimp.

Without hesitation, he placed it neatly onto her plate. The movement was natural, unforced, as if he had done it countless times before.

"You should eat more..." he said quietly.

There was no teasing in his tone. No awkwardness either.

Then he simply picked up his fork and started eating, silent and composed, as though placing food on her plate was the most ordinary thing he had done that evening.

Luna glanced at the shrimp for a brief second before looking up at him.

He didn’t look back.

Silence fell.

Luna stared at it.

Liam, standing nearby, nearly stopped breathing.

Sebastian Harper did not serve people food.

He did not entertain whims.

He did not break personal boundaries.

Well, he may have cooked breakfast once — but that had been different. That had been casual. Practical.

Something anyone could have done.

But serving someone?

That was personal.

Yet—

He had just done exactly that.

Luna recovered quickly.

He must love Jenny very much, she thought.

Inside, she smirked.

If only he knew he just served his greatest rival.

A mischievous impulse surfaced.

"Since you were so kind," she said smoothly, lifting a piece from her plate, "let me return the gesture."

She placed a meat onto his plate.

Liam’s soul left his body.

Everyone knew Sebastian had obsessive tendencies about his food. He disliked others touching it.

Jenny paused mid-chew.

Sebastian looked at the piece of food.

Then at Luna.

Their eyes locked.

For a long, suspended moment, the air tightened.

Luna expected rejection.

Instead—

He picked it up.

And ate it.

Liam nearly fainted.

Jenny blinked in confusion.

Luna herself was momentarily stunned.

No anger. No reaction. No disgust.

Just calm acceptance.

He chewed thoughtfully.

The undercurrent between them shifted.

It tastes good, he said.

What a joke... Aurora thought inwardly, almost amused by the quiet intimacy of the gesture.

She lowered her gaze to her plate and resumed eating, her expression smooth and unreadable. If the moment had unsettled her even slightly, she gave no sign of it.

Across the table, Sebastian continued his meal as though nothing unusual had occurred. Jenny, blissfully unaware of the undercurrents, chatted between bites, filling the silence with easy warmth.

No one addressed the small exchange.

No one needed to.

And just like that, the moment dissolved into normalcy.

The rest of the dinner went smoothly.

Sebastian kept his focus on his plate, at least outwardly.

But his thoughts were no longer on the food.

Earlier, when Aurora had reached across the table and casually picked a piece from the dish nearest her — placing it onto his plate without ceremony — he had almost paused.

She hadn’t made a show of it. No comment. No glance to check his reaction.

Just a simple, unthinking gesture.

And yet—

For reasons he refused to examine too closely, that single bite had tasted better than anything else on the table. 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

It wasn’t different in flavor. The seasoning hadn’t changed. The dish was the same as what everyone else was eating.

But the piece she had chosen for him—

It had felt different.

Warmer.

As if the act itself had altered the taste.

Sebastian kept eating now, composed as ever, but somewhere in his mind lingered a quiet realization:

It had been the tastiest thing he’d had all evening.

And he hadn’t even meant to notice.