I didn’t flinch. I stared at the dark water below, but the only thing my eyes could focus on was the silver glimmer of that hairpin catching the moonlight.
I didn’t shed a tear. I didn’t utter a single word. Because in that exact moment, the truth slammed into me like cold steel: she hadn’t accidentally fallen. She had staged it.
And he jumped in after her to complete the act.
As for me? I was done being part of their audience.
---
Darian eventually hauled himself back onto the yacht, clothes soaked and clinging to his skin, Vivienne limp in his arms as if she were made of fragile porcelain. Her head drooped backward, her limbs slack. He gently lowered her to the deck and immediately launched into CPR—compressions, breaths, shaking hands pressing against her chest.
“Vivienne,” he whispered again and again, voice trembling. “Come on. Stay with me. Breathe. Please, sweetheart—please—”
From the opposite end of the deck, I watched through blurry vision, my clothes heavy with water, my knees scraped raw against polished wood. And through the haze of tears, I saw it—just for the briefest of seconds.
Her mouth curved.
Not from pain.
Not from fear.
A smile.
She was acting.
The cough that followed came too late, too dramatic, a fragile, pitiful sound crafted for sympathy.
Darian’s breath hitched, and when she started sobbing, he gathered her close instantly. “It’s okay,” he murmured. “You’re safe now. I’ve got you.”
My chest ached—not with jealousy, not even with fury. But with the crushing realization that I was battling a ghost he chose to believe in. A ghost he would always protect.
He turned his gaze toward me, and in his eyes, I became the stain on his perfect night. The reason everything had gone wrong.
“You embarrassed her,” he said coldly.
“She jumped,” I rasped. “You SAW her jump.” But my words fell dead at his feet. Vivienne let out another trembling whimper against him, loud enough to sway any witnesses still watching.
“Darian… I was so terrified…” she whispered, pitiful and calculated.
That did it.
He rose to his feet slowly, rage twisting his features. He turned to his guards.
“Strip her.”
I jerked back in horror. “No! Darian, wait—!”
“Do it.”
Hands grabbed me. My dress was torn from my body like it was nothing but tissue. I fought—hard—but it didn’t matter. I was dragged to the center of the deck, left exposed beneath the spotlight, saltwater drying against my skin.
The whip cracked before I could brace myself.
The first strike ripped across my back, white-hot agony exploding through my nerves.
Guests gasped. Some covered their eyes. Others stared.
The second lash made me stumble.
The third tore into skin.
The fourth sent a metallic taste spilling into my mouth. I coughed violently. Then the blood came—fast, thick, too much.
I collapsed to my knees, trembling, arms weak and shaking as more blood dripped from my lips onto the gleaming floor.
I barely registered Darian’s frantic footsteps until he was kneeling right before me, gripping my face with trembling fingers.
“Lyra! What the hell—what’s happening to you?!”
My lips were slick with red, dripping down my chin. I tried to form words, but nothing came out.
Behind him, Vivienne suddenly bent forward, coughing violently, gagging—too dramatic to be real, but convincing to an untrained eye.
“I—I can’t breathe…” she sobbed.
That was all Darian needed to hear. Panic washed over him instantly.
“MED TEAM!” he bellowed toward the bridge. “Clear the helipad—NOW!”
They gathered Vivienne up like she was something priceless.
And me?
He didn’t even look at me again. His voice turned cold, flat.
“Take her home. Lock her in the basement.”
I was yanked away, dragged across the lower deck past horrified faces, past spilled wine and crushed rose petals. Through the private corridor. Into a waiting black car by the dock.
That night, I didn’t fall asleep on silk sheets.
I slept on cold stone.
Under the mansion where I once ruled.
While she rested in a hospital bed, faking every breath.
And Darian… still refused to see the truth.
---
By morning, his men pulled me out of the basement again. I didn’t get to change clothes. Didn’t get to clean the blood or the salt from my wounds. The car ride was rough, silent, merciless.
When the doors opened, rain came down in sheets, soaking me instantly. But that wasn’t what froze me in place.
It was where we were.
A cemetery.
No. No—
Not here.
My heart plummeted. Breath stuttered in my chest. My legs stopped moving.
“Darian,” I whispered, voice barely more than air. “Please. Don’t do this. Not here.”
He stood several feet away, unmoving, rain streaking down his coat. He watched me like I wasn’t someone he once vowed to protect—but a problem he was finally ready to solve.
“You’re done listening,” he said quietly. “You haven’t heard me for a long time. So now… this is the only way left.”
He nodded to his men.
“Start digging.”
“No!” I lunged forward, screaming, swinging at their arms. “Don’t touch her! Don’t you fucking dare!”
But Darian grabbed me, yanking me back by the waist. He spun me around and gripped my chin, forcing my gaze up to his.
“You disobeyed me,” he snarled. “You humiliated her. You mocked her pain. Now you’re going to learn what real loss feels like.”
I thrashed, fought, screamed until my voice tore. But no one paused. No one questioned.
The ground opened before me. Wet earth flew through the air as shovels tore through it, digging past stone and soil.
And then I saw it.
My mother’s urn.
Black. Rain-smeared. Half-buried in mud.
Something inside me shattered into pieces.
“No! Please—” I collapsed onto my knees, agony ripping through me. “That’s all I have left of her, Darian. Don’t—don’t do this. I’m begging you.”
He crouched beside the open grave, staring at the urn like it was trash. Like it meant nothing.
“The doctor sent me an update this morning,” he said calmly.
I froze.
“She went into respiratory arrest from water entering her lungs. There’s impact trauma, a dislocated hip, nerve damage. They don’t even know if she’ll ever dance again. You know how much she loves dancing. But you took that from her.”
He looked at me.
No warmth.
No remorse.
Only cold, deliberate cruelty.
“You think I’m going to forgive that?”
I shook my head wildly. “She jumped herself—Darian, she SMILED—”
“You broke her,” he said simply. “So now I break yours.”
And he dropped the urn.
It struck the mud with a sickening crack and burst apart. Ash scattered upward, caught on the wind, swirling with the rain like smoke escaping a burning pyre.
The scream that tore from my throat didn’t sound human. I lunged forward, clawing at the ground, trying to gather the shards, the mud-soaked ash, the remains of my mother dissolving in the storm.
Ash stuck to my skin. Ran down my arms in streaks of gray.
I ripped off my coat, trying to shield what was left.
But the rain washed her away.
Piece by piece.
Until there was nothing.
