Seraphina's POV
The elevator ride down is the longest moment of my life.
Damien stands beside me in silence. The wheelchair is folded away now, forgotten in the penthouse upstairs. He's not performing anymore. He doesn't need to. The mask is off, and what I see underneath terrifies me.
His jaw is clenched so tight I'm worried he'll break his own teeth. His hands are balled into fists. His breathing is controlled but violent, like he's restraining something desperate to break free.
I want to speak. To explain. To defend myself against Madison's accusations. But what would I say? She wasn't wrong. I did marry for money. I did sell myself. Every word that came out of her mouth was the truth wrapped in poison.
The elevator doors finally open to the penthouse lobby. A few guests are scattered around, trying to salvage their evening. They see us and immediately look away. No one wants to be near this kind of disaster.
We ride the private elevator to our floor in suffocating silence.
When the doors open to our penthouse, Damien walks toward his study without a word. He doesn't look at me. Doesn't comfort me. Doesn't even acknowledge that my entire life just imploded in front of everyone who matters.
I watch him disappear behind his office door, and something inside me breaks.
I run to my bedroom—my separate bedroom, where I've been sleeping for five years like I'm some kind of shameful secret—and collapse on the bed. The tears come immediately. Not delicate tears. Violent, ugly sobs that shake my entire body.
Everything I've tried to hide is now public knowledge. Every society woman at that gala will be whispering about me by morning. The media will pick up the story. Headlines will scream about the gold-digger who married a dying man. My reputation is destroyed. My dignity is obliterated.
And the worst part is that Madison was right.
I am a gold-digger. I sold myself. I traded my body, my name, my entire future for money. And I convinced myself it was noble. Selfless. A sacrifice for family. I told myself I was being generous. Strong. That I was saving everyone.
But I was lying to myself.
It was greed. It was weakness. It was desperation wearing a mask of sacrifice. Five years ago, I was nineteen years old and terrified. My father's debts were drowning us. My stepmother's medical bills were endless. Madison needed college. I had no options and no future. So I signed a contract with a dying man and pretended it was love.
The truth is uglier: I was relief. I was escape. I was willing to trade my soul to not be broke anymore.
And now the entire world knows it.
I cry until my throat is raw. Until my eyes burn. Until I have nothing left to give.
Hours pass. The penthouse is quiet. Too quiet. I keep waiting for Damien to come. To check on me. To be angry or disappointed or something. Instead, there's only silence.
The silence is worse than anything else. Because silence means he doesn't care. Silence means I'm not worth comforting. Silence means this marriage is exactly what I always knew it was: a business transaction with nothing underneath.
I should feel relieved. I should feel free. Instead, I feel abandoned.
I shower to wash away the gala. The dress comes off. The makeup comes off. The perfect Mrs. Ashford disappears down the drain. What remains is just Seraphina—the girl who sold herself for money, exposed for exactly what she is.
By midnight, I'm lying in bed, unable to sleep, unable to breathe properly. My heart is pounding so hard I think it might break through my ribs. Every sound in the penthouse makes me tense. Every creak of the floor. Every whisper of air conditioning. Every moment of silence.
I keep thinking about his expression. The way his face shifted when he realized I was watching. The way his eyes burned with something dark and possessive and absolutely terrifying. The way he commanded me to bed like I was a possession he owned.
And I obeyed.
I obeyed because part of me—some twisted, broken part of me—wanted to. Because someone cared enough about me to hurt someone who hurt me. Because for the first time in my life, I wasn't invisible. I was claimed. Protected. Important enough to kill for.
That thought alone should horrify me.
Instead, it makes me understand how dangerous Damien Ashford really is.
Then I hear it.
Movement in the penthouse. Damien's footsteps. His door opening. Something that sounds like him making a call.
I strain to hear but catch only fragments.
"Yes, I know where she is... No, she won't run... Yes, that will be sufficient... Do it."
My heart stops. Do what? Who is he talking to? Who won't run?
There's another pause. Then:
"I don't care what she did. I care what she did to my wife."
My blood goes cold. He's talking about Madison.
I slip out of bed and move to the door. Through the crack, I see Damien standing in the hallway, his phone to his ear. He's wearing an expensive suit, fresh and unwrinkled. Different from what he wore to the gala. His hair is wet like he's showered recently. And his expression is utterly blank.
"Handle it," he says, and hangs up.
He stands there for a moment, staring at nothing. Then his head turns slowly. Deliberately. Like he knows I'm watching from the dark doorway.
Our eyes meet.
And in that split second, I see something shift in his face. Something predatory wakes up behind his eyes. Something that's been waiting. Watching. Hunting.
In that moment, I understand something that terrifies me: Damien Ashford is not a dying man afraid of losing me. He's a dangerous man who's been caged, and Madison just gave him permission to break free.
"Sera," he says quietly, seeing me in the doorway. "Go to bed."
"What did you—" I start.
"Bed. Now."
The command in his voice is absolute. I'm not being asked. I'm being ordered. And something in my body responds to that command before my mind can argue.
I retreat back into my room and close the door. My hands are shaking. My mind is racing.
What did he just do? Who was he talking to? And why did those words—"I don't care what she did. I care what she did to my wife"—sound like a death sentence?
But there's only silence.
The kind of silence that comes before something terrible.
The kind of silence that makes you understand: some things, once set in motion, can never be stopped.
And somewhere in the darkness of Manhattan, I realize that Madison has no idea what she's done. She has no idea that her cruel speech at a charity gala just signed her death warrant.
She has no idea because she doesn't know the truth about Damien Ashford.
But I'm starting to.
And that's the most terrifying realization of all.