It started with a phone call.
Serena was in the middle of a meeting with her PR manager when her assistant slipped into the room, face pale, phone trembling slightly in her hand.
"Ms. Graves, it's Gloss Magazine."
Serena's heart lifted immediately.
The Power Couples spread.
The photoshoot.
Everything she'd worked to polish and frame into perfection.
She snatched the phone with a dazzling smile.
"Hello, this is Serena."
Her smile faltered within three sentences.
"Unfortunately," the editor said, voice oozing with regret,
"we're postponing the feature indefinitely.
There's been... shifting market priorities, you understand.
New angles. New faces."
New faces.
Meaning not hers.
Meaning the shine had dulled, faster than she realized.
Serena kept her voice calm, professional.
She thanked them. She hung up.
Then she stood in the middle of the gallery, staring at the floor, her phone loose in her fingers.
Malik found her like that later — frozen, beautiful, brittle.
He approached quietly, his footsteps echoing in the cavernous space.
"Something wrong?" he asked.
Serena turned too quickly, smile stitched back onto her face.
"No. Nothing."
A bright laugh. Too bright.
"Just... rescheduling issues. You know how these magazines are. Trends change."
Malik nodded slowly.
"Of course," he said, voice smooth as glass.
"Trends change all the time."
He didn't press.
Didn't comfort.
Just left her standing there, drowning in her own perfect silence.
That night, Serena threw herself into fixing it.
Calls to old contacts.
Emails to PR teams.
Reaching out to former investors who, suddenly, weren't answering quite as quickly.
It was manageable, she told herself.
Just a rough patch.
Nothing she couldn't charm her way out of.
After all—
She still had Celina's success.
She still had the gallery.
She still had Malik.
Didn't she?
Across the city, Malik reviewed a different set of documents.
Victoria Lane's latest update:
Two additional sponsors withdrawing "for unrelated reasons."
Whisper campaigns about the gallery's "questionable taste" in avant-garde sponsorships.
All carefully placed.
All meticulously distant from Malik's name.
He scrolled past the legal paperwork to a final note:
"Timeline for clean filing ready upon your signal."
Malik leaned back in his chair, closing his eyes for a long moment.
It was almost time.
Not for revenge.
Not for rage.
Just for... release.
In another week, Serena would still be smiling for photographers.
Still booking interviews.
Still clinging to the image she had built from borrowed light.
She wouldn't even see the darkness swallowing her until it was too late.
And Malik Graves would be there—
Standing in the ruins.
Unbothered.
Unbroken.
Free.