Seraphina did not sleep the night before the ceremony. She lay in the dark listening to the slow sound of generators powering the outdoor lighting and the distant movement of staff finishing preparations across the estate. Every sound felt different, as though the house itself understood that something terrible was about to happen.
She had chosen her path now and she had to survive it because public humiliation was not an abstract fear, it had shape and consequence. It would look like headlines, sound like whispers in boardrooms, feel like her mother's shocked silence and her father's strained disappointment.
Adrian was counting on that fear to control her, he believed she would never risk such embarrassment. She turned onto her side and looked at the faint outline of the wedding gown hanging near the window.
Tomorrow, she would walk out in white but she would not be walking toward him. Her phone was on the nightstand, and the screen lit up briefly with a new message.
