Monday came the way all Mondays did—merciless and fast.
The morning light spilled through the tall windows of the penthouse, washing everything in a clinical, indifferent glow. The city hummed to life below them. Car horns, coffee carts, the low drone of a thousand ambitions grinding against each other.
Malik Graves moved through it all like a ghost wearing a man's suit.
He dressed carefully: navy slacks, crisp white shirt, tailored charcoal blazer. Every line sharp. Every button fastened. On the outside, he looked exactly the same as he always had—maybe better. The edge to him was cleaner now, honed.
Inside, there was only silence.
Not sadness.
Not anger.
Just the cold, deliberate stillness of a man who had finally let go.
Serena floated into the kitchen mid-morning, hair tousled like she'd just rolled out of a dream. She wore one of his shirts—slightly too big, hanging off one bare shoulder—paired with delicate gold earrings she probably didn't realize she'd forgotten to remove.
She smiled when she saw him. Bright, easy. Too easy.
"Morning," she said, voice soft with just a touch of playful guilt. "I didn't hear you get up."
"I had work," Malik said simply, sipping his coffee.
She walked over, slipping her arms around his waist like they were still in some old photograph—happy, whole, untouched by rot.
He let her.
He even kissed her forehead when she tilted her head up.
It was terrifyingly easy to fake it now.
At the office, Malik moved like a machine.
He crushed meetings. Finalized contracts. Reviewed zoning applications and development blueprints with laser focus. Jordan, his assistant, barely kept up, her heels clicking against the marble floors as she trailed behind him.
"Mr. Graves," she said after his third back-to-back meeting, "Are you... alright? You're working through the whole week's schedule in a single day."
Malik smiled. A small, tight thing.
"Just clearing space," he said.
"For what?"
He didn't answer.
Jordan blinked, then lowered her voice. "If it's about Mrs. Graves—"
"Jordan," he interrupted, smooth and firm, "nothing's wrong."
A lie.
But it slipped out of him effortlessly now, like breathing.
That evening, Serena suggested dinner at a new rooftop restaurant.
"It's supposed to have the best view in the city," she said, twirling the reservation card between her fingers. "Private tables. Great wine. Just us."
Malik agreed easily.
No hesitation. No bitterness.
He watched Serena carefully that night: the way she leaned in across the candlelight, the way her laugh rang out just a little too loud, the way her smile faltered whenever he looked at her for too long.
She could feel it.
The distance.
But she didn't understand it yet.
She thought it was fatigue. Stress.
Something fixable with champagne and compliments.
Malik let her believe it.
He let her talk about gallery expansions and summer exhibitions and new investors she was courting—glancing casually over her wine glass when she dropped Landon's name like it meant nothing.
And he smiled.
Because now, finally, it meant nothing to him too.
That night, lying beside her in bed, Malik stared at the ceiling, feeling the chill of the sheets between them like a frozen river.
Serena murmured something in her sleep, curling closer, her hand brushing his chest.
Once, he would have pulled her in.
Now, he simply let her drift back into dreams without reaching for her.
There would be no more reaching.
Only watching.
Only waiting.
And when the time came,
Serena wouldn't even see it coming.