LOGINThe verdict was delivered on a gray morning.Not dramatic. Not delayed. Just scheduled, listed among other proceedings on the docket as if it were an ordinary matter. That normalcy unsettled Lillian more than ceremony ever could have.Ordinary was how this had survived for so long.She watched from a small room adjacent to the courtroom, the feed muted, the screen angled so she could see faces rather than hear arguments already exhausted. Elena sat beside her, fingers interlaced tightly enough to whiten the knuckles.Nathaniel stood behind them, still, his presence a steady line rather than a shield.The prosecutor rose.Charges were read again. Conspiracy. Manipulation of public infrastructure res
The moment happened because no one planned it.That was what unsettled Lillian most afterward.It began with silence, the rare kind that did not demand conversation. Night had set
The conference room at Crosswell Dominion was smaller than most, deliberately so. No panoramic windows. No city spread beneath glass. Just polished wood, muted lighting, and a table that forced proximity.Nathaniel
Morning arrived without ceremony.The storm had passed in the night, leaving the grounds of Celestine Heights washed clean and gleaming beneath pale sunlight. The windows no longer rattled. The air no longer pressed







