LOGINVICTORIAFOURTEEN MONTHS LATER…I was standing in front of a floor-length mirror in the most expensive suite at the Ritz Paris, wearing a wedding dress I had designed myself, and Isabella was crying, which she would definitely describe as completely unnecessary if she weren't also fixing my veil with hands that weren't entirely steady."You look obscene," she said, which was her way of saying something was really beautiful."Thank you," I said.My mother knocked and came in without waiting, which was something she had been doing since she moved to New York seven months ago. She walked into places like she belonged in them, which she did. She always had. She had just been kept out of them for too long.She was wearing the dusty rose gown I had made for her. Her hair was done. She looked like a woman who had survived a lot of hard things and came out of the other side still herself, which was the most beautiful way I knew to describe a person.She stood behind me in the mirror."Your fa
VICTORIAThe trial started on a bright Monday in January.I testified on the second day, wearing a white pantsuit which I had picked the night before while Clark sat on the edge of the bed and watched me hold it up against myself in the mirror. He didn't say anything because he actually didn't need to. We both knew what the color meant.I sat in the witness box for four hours. I didn't ask for a break. Of course, I didn't need one.I told them everything. The way the Hawthorne Syndicate had run their scheme for decades. The duplicate they had created of me. The forged documents and fake photographs. The way they had poisoned my mother and kept her hidden. The way they had used the leverage they had against women like me over and over again, for years, with no one stopping them.I listed names. I laid out the evidence piece by piece. I didn't even raise my voice once.When Celestine's attorney stood up and suggested that I had built my whole testimony around personal revenge, I looked
CLARKI had been wanting to ask Victoria something for four months.The ring had been sitting in the inner pocket of my coat that whole time. A diamond ring set in platinum, so beautiful and not too large, which I’d taken a lot of time to carefully choose.I’d thought about how to do it a lot of times. And every single time, I’d talked myself out of it. Either the moment felt too big, too small, too carefully set up, or not thoughtful enough. I had walked into boardrooms full of people who wanted to destroy me and kept my voice steady. But this had me nervous in a way none of that ever had.The thing about Victoria was that she didn't need this. She didn't need me. She had rebuilt herself from the ground up with her own hands, and she had done it with more dignity than most people managed in a lifetime. What she had done was want me. And wanting, when you were someone like Victoria who could survive perfectly well without anyone, meant a whole lot more than needing.I almost asked her
VICTORIANathaniel Voss was found on a Thursday morning.He hadn't made it to wherever he had been trying to go. Federal agents found him at a private estate in Portugal, working alongside Interpol and the two prosecutors I had been in contact with for months. He was taken in without much of a struggle, which surprised a lot of people. He had been talked about for so long in such large terms that I think some people had started to imagine him as more than a man who had finally run out of places to go.Calloway sent me a text at 7:14 in the morning. I was in the middle of a board meeting for Hale Couture's expansion into the European market when my phone buzzed on the table. I picked it up, read it, set it face down, and went back to the presentation without saying a word.Clark was sitting two seats to my right. He didn't ask anything. He didn't say anything either. But I saw him notice the way my shoulders dropped just slightly, like a huge weight had just been eased off my shoulder
VICTORIACelestine's final appeal was clever and sharp in all the ways I had expected from her.Her lawyers argued that the Cross trust had been wrongly released because my biological claim had been filed after the estate's original dispute had already closed. Technically, it was a thin argument. Anyone who looked at it closely enough could see it was more for delay than actually achieving anything. But delay was exactly what she needed. Another six months of back-and-forth in court would drain Hale Couture's executives and give whatever was left of the Syndicate's legal team time to regroup.Sandra walked me through all of it at the kitchen table that morning. She had her laptop open and was already talking through the standard ways we could push back.I stopped her halfway through. "I don't want to beat it the normal way," I said.Sandra looked at me over her glasses. "What are you thinking?""I want to meet with Celestine directly," I said. "No attorneys. No press, no record. Just
VICTORIAThe Cross trust changed everything and nothing at the same time.Sandra called me at nine in the morning while I was still in the car heading to the office. She went through the details fast. The trust had been fully released and processed, and the legal side of it was stronger than even she had expected. By eleven, the Hale Couture board had called an emergency session.I walked into that boardroom in a black blazer and my hair down, and every single person around that table voted to confirm me as the sole CEO unanimously. The man who had been the most difficult in the previous months, who had spent the last year making my life harder at every turn, was the first one to say yes. He didn't even pause.I thanked them briefly. And then I went back to my office, sat at my desk, and looked out at the city for a full two minutes before I let myself breathe.But I had learned a long time ago not to celebrate before everything was completely done. And I was right to wait.Trent cam
VICTORIAI slammed the laptop shut so hard that it felt like the whole penthouse shook with it. My hands were shaking, and I didn’t even try to hide it. Clark grabbed the laptop right away, almost like he thought it might jump open again. He checked the lid from every angle, his jaw narrowing as he
VICTORIAI couldn’t see anything. Not even my own hands. Gasps broke out everywhere. A couple of people screamed. Someone ran into a table, and it made a loud crashing sound that echoed through the huge space.“Stay close to me,” Clark said. His hand grabbed my arm firmly right away. I didn’t eve
VICTORIAFor a second, I couldn’t move. The photo on Clark’s phone was burned into my memory so clearly that it felt like the shadowy figure was still standing behind me. I tried to breathe, but it came out harshly. The room felt too bright, too small, and too crowded. Clark didn’t waste any time.
VICTORIAI froze right where I stood. The footsteps behind me made my whole body stiffen. Cold air slipped in through the open window and brushed my bare arms, making me shiver. I turned around quickly, now ready to catch whoever it was, but the room behind me was empty. The whole penthouse was si







