The world did not end with a bang. It ended with silence. The Blackwood penthouse, once a battleground of whispered arguments, guarded pauses, and emotional landmines, felt strangely hollow in the days after the boardroom reckoning. The press was busy tearing Severin apart, board was busy stabilizing, and Lawyers came and went like ghosts. But inside the walls of Damian’s life, everything was quiet. Too quiet. Arielle noticed it first in the way Damian moved. He was still decisive, still sharp, but the adrenaline that had fueled him through the crisis had drained away, leaving something raw beneath. He slept little, spoke less, and when he looked at her, there was no calculation anymore, only something unguarded and frightened, like a man standing at the edge of something irreversible. On the third morning after the vote, Damian asked her to come with him. Not to a meeting, not to a gala, and definitely not to war. “Just us,” he said, voice low. “I want to show you something.”
Last Updated : 2026-02-24 Read more