The first thing Saylor changed was the music room.
Dominic came home from the office on a Thursday and found the framed lyrics gone—three pieces I had written in our second year of marriage, matted in linen and hung where morning light would catch them through the east windows. In their place: a series of abstract prints Saylor had ordered from a Chelsea gallery, geometric shapes in coral and gold that cost more than the frames they replaced.
He stood in the doorway with his briefcase still in hand.
"I thought it needed updating," Saylor said from the hallway. She was wearing one of my robes—silk, cream-colored, something I had left behind because it no longer mattered. "The old stuff was kind of depressing."
Dominic set his briefcase down. Looked at the empty wall where my handwriting used to live.
"It's fine," he said.
By the end of the week, the studio was gone entirely. The upright piano I had played every morning, the microphone stand, the corkboard covered in half-finished verses—all of it packed up and moved into storage. Saylor converted the space into a walk-in wardrobe, floor-to-ceiling racks installed by a contractor who worked through the weekend.
Dominic signed the invoice without reading it.
The dinner party was two weeks later. Twelve investors, the kind of people who wrote checks with too many zeroes and expected results in return. Dominic had planned it carefully—menu, seating chart, talking points. Saylor wore a dress that cost what most people made in a month and smiled like she had been doing this her whole life.
The first hour went smoothly. Wine poured. Appetizers circulated. Dominic guided conversations with the ease of someone who had done this a hundred times.
Then Gerald Moss, a silver-haired executive who had funded three platinum albums, turned to Saylor with the polite curiosity of a man making small talk.
"So, Saylor," he said, "walk me through your creative process. How do you approach a new song?"
The table went quiet.
Saylor's smile did not falter. She set her wine glass down. Tilted her head.
"Well," she said, "I just... feel it, you know? Like, the vibe comes to me, and I let it flow."
Gerald nodded slowly. "And lyrically? Do you write from personal experience, or—"
"Oh, totally personal," Saylor said. "I mean, I think the best songs are the ones that come from, like, a real place. You know?"
Across the table, another investor—a woman named Claudia Ren who had built her fortune on artist development—exchanged a glance with Gerald. It lasted less than a second.
Dominic saw it.
He leaned forward, voice smooth. "Saylor's being modest. Her instinct for melody is extraordinary. We've got a team building around her strengths."
Claudia smiled. Sipped her wine. Said nothing.
The conversation moved on.
Afterward, when the last guest had left and the catering staff had cleared the table, Dominic stood in the kitchen and poured a glass of Scotch. Neat. Expensive. The kind I used to buy him for anniversaries.
He held it. Did not drink.
Saylor came in, heels in hand, makeup smudged. "That went well, right?"
Dominic set the glass down.
"Yes," he said.
She kissed his cheek and went upstairs.
He stood there in the empty kitchen, looking at the glass, and thought about the way Freya used to sit at the island with her notebook, humming under her breath, writing lyrics in the margins of grocery lists.
He picked up his phone. Put it down. Poured the Scotch into the sink.
---
The email came three days later.
Dominic read it twice. Then a third time.
*Dominic—checking in on studio progress with Saylor. Four sessions in, no usable material yet. She's cycling through reference tracks but not generating original content. Vocal performance is solid, but we need lyrics and melody to move forward. Let us know how you'd like to proceed. —Marcus*
He closed his laptop. Opened it again. Stared at the screen.
Then he called Conrad Hale.
"I need ghostwriters," Dominic said. "Discreet. Contract them through shell credits. I want three options by end of week."
Conrad did not ask why.
"Budget?"
"Whatever it takes."
"Done," Conrad said, and hung up.
Dominic sat in his office with the city stretched out below him, fifty floors of glass and steel, and tried to remember the last time he had heard Saylor hum.
He could not.
---
Marilyn drove three hours upstate on a Saturday morning. She brought a thermos of black coffee and three letters sealed in plain envelopes, no return address, written in careful longhand over three separate weeks.
The visitation room smelled like floor cleaner and old air. We sat across a table bolted to the floor. Her hands were cold when I took them.
"You look tired," she said quietly.
"I'm okay."
She studied my face. The bruise on my shoulder had faded to yellow-green. I had not mentioned it in our phone calls.
"Your father's been different," she said. "Evasive. He takes calls in the other room. Comes home late."
I nodded.
"Something's wrong," she said. "I don't know what. But I know it involves you."
I held her hands tighter.
"When it's over," I said, "you'll know everything. And when you know, I need you to be ready to leave."
Marilyn went very still.
Then she nodded once.
"Okay," she said.
We sat in silence. Outside, a guard called time.
Marilyn stood. Kissed my forehead. Left the thermos.
I watched her walk away—shoulders straight, steps measured—and knew she would be ready when the time came.
I opened the thermos. The coffee was still warm.
I drank it slowly, and began to hum.
