Kenia Hayes POV
Compliance is a costume.
It fits tighter than the silk dress Holden forced me to wear for the rehearsal dinner, and it suffocates me just as much.
For forty-eight hours, I have been the perfect, porcelain doll.
I ate when he told me to eat.
I smiled when he made a joke at my expense.
I sat quietly in the corner of the penthouse while he took calls about shipments and territories, acting as if the woman he threw off a cliff wasn't sitting ten feet away, breathing the same recycled air.
He thinks he broke me.
He thinks the silence is submission.
He doesn't know that silence is the whetstone where I sharpen the knife.
The morning of the wedding arrived with a sky the color of a fresh bruise.
Holden was frantic, pacing the living room in his boxers, his phone in one hand and a silk tie in the other.
"Where is the file for the Port Authority?" he snapped, his gaze snapping to me.
I was sitting on the sofa, hands folded demurely in my lap.
"It's on your iPad," I said softly.
He grabbed the device from the coffee table and tapped the screen aggressively.
He frowned.
"It's locked. What's the passcode?"
He looked at me, expecting me to rattle it off like a good little secretary.
"I don't know," I lied. Smooth. Simple.
"You set it up, Kenia. What is it?"
"Try your birthday," I suggested.
He tapped it in.
The screen shook. *Incorrect.*
"Try the day we met," he said, his thumb hovering over the glass.
He paused.
He looked up at me, a flicker of genuine confusion clouding his eyes.
"When was that? June? July?"
He didn't know.
Three years of my life, three years of devotion, and he couldn't place the starting line.
"Try Estella's birthday," I said.
My voice was flat. Dead.
He typed it in.
The iPad unlocked.
He didn't even look ashamed. He didn't even flinch.
He just sighed with relief and started scrolling through documents.
"I have to go," he said, distracted, already mentally halfway out the door. "The car is waiting. Stay here. Don't go near the windows. I'll send someone for you after the ceremony. We can... celebrate."
He walked over and kissed my forehead.
It felt like a brand.
"Be good, Kenia."
The moment the elevator doors slid shut, the doll disintegrated.
I didn't run.
Running attracts attention.
I walked with purpose.
I went to the bedroom and pulled the framed photo of us from the nightstand.
We were smiling in it. I looked happy.
I hated that girl.
I took it to the bathroom sink.
I doused it in his expensive cologne, the scent of sandalwood and arrogance filling the small space.
I struck a match and dropped it.
The flame caught instantly, curling the edges of my smile, turning our memory into ash and black smoke.
I watched it burn until the glass cracked from the heat.
Then I turned and walked out of the penthouse.
The guards at the door nodded, but their bodies shifted to block the exit.
"Mr. Dalton said you stay inside," one of them said, stepping into my path.
"Mr. Dalton forgot his cufflinks," I said, my voice laced with frantic urgency. I held up a small velvet box I had emptied moments ago. "He told me to run them down to the car immediately. Do you want to be the reason he looks sloppy at the altar? Do you want to explain to him why he's not wearing them?"
The guard hesitated.
He looked at his partner, weighing the risk of disobedience against the risk of Holden's temper.
"Five minutes," he grunted.
I stepped into the elevator.
I didn't go to the lobby.
I hit the button for the service level.
I walked out the back exit, past the dumpsters that smelled of rotting flowers and stale champagne.
A black SUV was idling at the curb.
The window rolled down an inch.
Arthur, the man who had driven me to the hospital, was behind the wheel.
"Ms. Hayes," he acknowledged.
"Drive," I said, opening the back door.
I climbed in.
The lock clicked.
I didn't look back at the golden tower.
I pulled out the burner phone and opened the livestream link for the wedding.
I needed to see it.
I needed to see the exact moment his world cracked.
