The Maybach tore down the empty streets of Manhattan.

The air pressure inside the sealed cabin was suffocating. Harrison sat completely still, his dark eyes locked onto Iris's trembling form in the corner.

Iris refused to meet his gaze. She wrapped her arms tightly around her bare shoulders.

She shivered violently, her teeth chattering as the car's air conditioning blew over her exposed skin. Tears continued to stream down her face in perfect, tragic lines.

This leather seat is freezing, her mind complained bitterly. If I knew he was going to kidnap me, I would have worn pants. My legs are going numb.

Harrison felt a sudden, exhausting wave of fatigue.

He had been ready to scream at her, to demand answers, but hearing her complain about the temperature completely derailed his fury.

He let out a hollow, humorless laugh and turned his face toward the window.

The car jerked to a halt in the private underground garage of his Tribeca penthouse.

Harrison shoved his door open. He reached across the seat, grabbed Iris by the upper arm, and dragged her out of the car.

Iris's high heels hit the concrete hard. Her ankle buckled.

She let out a soft cry and let her body fall forward, intentionally collapsing against Harrison's chest. She pressed her soft curves against his rigid muscles, hoping the physical contact would spark some lingering affection.

Harrison reacted as if she were covered in acid.

He shoved her backward with brutal force.

Iris slammed hard against the side of the Maybach. The impact knocked the wind out of her, and she let out a genuine groan of pain.

"Save the routine," Harrison said coldly.

He turned and marched toward the private elevator. Iris gritted her teeth, her eyes flashing with pure hatred at his back, and limped after him.

The elevator shot up to the penthouse. The doors slid open.

Harrison grabbed her arm again, hauled her into the massive, dimly lit living room, and threw her onto the expensive Italian leather sofa.

Iris tumbled onto the cushions. Her wild, wavy hair fell across her face.

She slowly pushed herself up. She looked at him with huge, devastated eyes, her chest heaving.

Harrison ripped his tie completely off and threw it onto the Persian rug.

He leaned forward, planting both hands heavily on the back of the sofa, trapping her in his shadow.

"What kind of monster are you?" Harrison hissed, his voice vibrating with disgust.

Iris flinched. Fresh tears welled up instantly.

"I love you!" she sobbed, her voice breaking perfectly. "I couldn't handle the divorce! I just wanted to drink until I forgot you!"

Harrison stared at her flawless performance. If he couldn't hear the truth, he would have fallen to his knees and begged for her forgiveness.

Iris watched his face. She needed to hit him where it hurt. She needed to remind him of their bond.

She started thinking about the nights they had spent on this exact sofa.

Honestly, his technique was always so boring, her inner voice sighed loudly in his head. Every time we did it, it felt like he was just completing a chore. I just treated it as a complimentary clause in our business contract.

The words hit Harrison like a physical bullet to the chest.

His brain completely short-circuited.

For three years, he had prided himself on being a dominant, attentive husband. He thought he controlled every aspect of their marriage, including their physical intimacy.

And she had viewed it as a chore. A complimentary clause.

A wave of absolute, crushing humiliation washed over him. It burned through his veins, destroying his pride, his ego, his entire sense of self.

He stood up straight. The anger drained out of his face, leaving behind a look of profound, sickening revulsion.

He looked at her as if she were a piece of rotting garbage on his floor.

Iris saw the drastic shift in his expression. She didn't understand what she had done wrong.

Panic flared in her chest. She reached out, her fingers brushing the edge of his suit jacket.

Harrison took a massive step backward, dodging her touch with violent disgust.

He took a deep breath, fighting the urge to vomit.

He pointed a shaking finger toward the heavy oak front door.

"Get out," Harrison said. His voice was completely dead. There was no anger left, only absolute zero.

Iris froze. She had expected him to yell. She had expected him to break things.

She had never seen him look this disgusted.

Did he figure it out? her mind raced frantically. That look is terrifying. I need to get out of here before he snaps.

Iris scrambled off the sofa. She didn't bother fixing her twisted dress.

She grabbed her small clutch from the floor and practically ran toward the door.

Just before she grabbed the handle, she paused. She turned back, letting one final, perfect tear roll down her cheek.

Then she opened the door and fled.

The heavy door slammed shut. The massive penthouse plunged into a deafening silence.

Harrison's knees gave out. He collapsed onto the sofa, burying his face in his hands.

A complimentary clause.

The words echoed in his empty apartment. He felt like the biggest joke in the world.

He didn't want simple revenge anymore. He wanted complete and utter annihilation. He wanted to prove that without him, she was nothing but a hollow shell. He wanted to give her the rope and watch her hang herself with it. By giving her exactly what she wanted, he would strip away her safety net and watch her true colors bleed out for the world to see.

He pulled his phone from his pocket and dialed his executive assistant, Elias.

"Expedite the asset transfer," Harrison ordered, his voice cold and razor-sharp. "Get her money into her accounts by tomorrow morning. Let her have her millions. I want to see exactly how fast she destroys herself with it."

The morning sun blasted through the floor-to-ceiling windows of the penthouse bedroom.

Harrison groaned, squeezing his eyes shut. His head throbbed violently from the whiskey he had consumed the night before.

His phone buzzed relentlessly on the nightstand.

He reached out blindly, grabbed the device, and pressed it to his ear.

"Mr. Torres," his private attorney's crisp voice came through the speaker. "The fifty million dollar trust fund has been fully transferred to Ms. Cooper's account."

Harrison stared blankly at the ceiling.

"The divorce decree is officially active," the lawyer continued. "You are legally severed."

Harrison hung up without saying a word.

He turned his head and looked at the empty left side of the king-sized bed. The sheets were perfectly smooth.

A sudden, irrational spike of irritation flared in his chest.

He opened his phone and tapped on his iMessage app. He pulled up Iris's contact.

He wanted to send one last text. Just to prove he didn't care.

He typed: Take your money and stay the hell away from me.

He hit send.

Instantly, a bright red exclamation point popped up next to the blue bubble. Not Delivered.

Harrison stared at the screen. His thumb hovered over the glass.

She blocked him.

The woman who had spent three years pretending to worship the ground he walked on had blocked his number the second the check cleared.

A hot rush of anger flooded his brain.

He opened Instagram and typed her handle into the search bar. User not found.

He threw the blankets off, his jaw clenched tight. He grabbed his work tablet from his briefcase and logged into his assistant Elias's account.

He searched for Iris. Her profile popped up immediately.

She had posted a new Story, restricted to a close circle of friends.

Harrison tapped the glowing circle.

The screen filled with a photo of Iris. She was lying on the deck of a luxury yacht, wearing a tiny, neon-pink bikini. She was holding up a glass of champagne, laughing brightly at the camera.

The caption read: Finally escaped the cage! Single life is the best life! with a clinking glasses emoji.

Harrison's grip on the tablet tightened until the glass screen groaned under the pressure.

He hurled the tablet across the room. It smashed into the wall and shattered into pieces.

He stormed out of the bedroom, his bare feet slapping against the hardwood floor.

He walked into the massive, open-concept kitchen. He needed black coffee. Now.

He stood in front of the fifty-thousand-dollar custom Italian espresso machine. He stared at the complex array of chrome dials, levers, and buttons, a process she had always made look entirely effortless. For three years, a perfectly brewed cup of black coffee was simply waiting for him on the marble island the moment he walked in. He knew the basic mechanics, but his patience was nonexistent. He pressed what he thought was the correct sequence of extraction buttons and twisted the pressure valve.

The machine let out a high-pitched warning beep. It whirred aggressively, then sputtered, producing a weak, watery liquid that was an absolute insult to the premium beans. Finally, a jet of scalding hot steam shot out of the side pipe, narrowly missing Harrison's hand. He slammed his fist against the marble counter in sheer frustration.

He abandoned the kitchen and marched into his walk-in closet to get dressed.

He pulled out a navy blue tailored suit. He reached for the specific silver silk tie he always wore with it.

He stared at the wall of hundreds of neatly rolled ties. He had no idea where it was.

He spent twenty minutes tearing through the drawers, ruining the perfect organization. He couldn't find the tie. He also realized his favorite pair of sapphire cufflinks was missing.

A deep, suffocating sense of frustration settled over him.

Iris was a liar and a manipulator, but she had managed his life with terrifying efficiency. Without her, his daily routine was completely paralyzed.

Harrison grabbed a random black tie, threw it around his neck, and left the apartment.

When he stepped off the private elevator at the Torres Group headquarters, the air on the top floor instantly froze.

The employees took one look at his dark, murderous expression and glued their eyes to their monitors.

Elias, his assistant, nervously followed him into the CEO office, holding an iPad.

"Your schedule for today, sir-"

"Why isn't there a housekeeper at my apartment?" Harrison snapped, throwing his briefcase onto the desk.

Elias swallowed hard. "Sir, the former Mrs. Torres refused to let outside staff into the private residence. She insisted on handling all domestic duties personally."

Harrison's lip curled into a sneer at the word personally.

"Call the best agency in New York," Harrison ordered, sitting down heavily in his leather chair. "I want a top-tier estate manager hired by the end of the day."

"Yes, sir," Elias said, turning to leave.

"Wait." Harrison's voice was sharp.

He pointed a finger at Elias. His eyes were cold and calculating.

"Run an inventory on the penthouse. Find out exactly what she took when she moved out. I'm missing a pair of cufflinks."

Elias blinked in surprise. A billionaire CEO caring about a single pair of cufflinks was absurd. But he nodded quickly and rushed out the door.

Harrison leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.

The image of Iris laughing in that pink bikini burned against the back of his eyelids.

The divorce hadn't brought him peace. It had thrown his entire existence into chaos, and he hated her for it.

At three o'clock in the afternoon, Elias knocked timidly on the heavy oak door of the CEO's office.

He walked in carrying a thick stack of premium resumes.

Harrison looked up from a mountain of legal documents. His eyes were dark and deeply irritated. He glared at the resumes as if they were offensive.

"I contacted three elite domestic staffing agencies, sir," Elias reported, keeping his voice steady. "They are sending five candidates directly to the penthouse this evening for on-site interviews."

Harrison gave a curt nod, his attention already drifting back to his paperwork.

Elias hesitated. He pulled a single sheet of paper from his folder and placed it on the desk.

"Regarding the inventory, sir," Elias said carefully. "The former Mrs. Torres did not take your cufflinks. However... she left behind a significant amount of her own personal property in the master closet."

Harrison picked up the paper.

It was a long list. Hermes Birkin bags, custom Chanel dresses, Cartier jewelry. Millions of dollars worth of luxury goods, just abandoned.

Harrison's jaw tightened.

She had cried and begged for fifty million dollars, acting like she would starve on the streets. Now that she had the cash, she didn't even care enough to pack her own priceless belongings.

The blatant disrespect made the veins in Harrison's neck throb.

He slammed the paper down on the desk.

"Call her," Harrison ordered, his voice dangerously low. "Tell her she has until tonight to clear this garbage out of my apartment, or I am having it thrown into the incinerator."

Elias didn't dare argue. He pulled out his work phone, dialed Iris's number, and pressed the speaker button. He placed the phone on the desk.

The line rang. And rang.

Just as the call was about to go to voicemail, someone picked up.

Instantly, the deafening sound of heavy bass, electronic synths, and the roaring cheers of a crowd flooded the quiet office. But then, the chaotic music suddenly muffled, the heavy wooden thud of a door closing echoing through the line as if she had quickly ducked into a restroom or a soundproofed VIP hallway.

"Hello?" Iris's voice slurred slightly over the speaker, now clear enough to hear over the distant, vibrating bass. She sounded breathless and incredibly happy. "Who is interrupting my vibe?"

Elias cleared his throat loudly. "Ms. Cooper, this is Elias from the Torres Group. Mr. Torres has requested that you return to the penthouse immediately to remove your remaining personal items."

Iris let out a bright, careless laugh.

"Tell him I'm busy on a date," she yelled over the music. "I don't have time for that old junk. Tell him to throw it in the trash."

As soon as she finished speaking, her inner voice transmitted directly into Harrison's brain.

That uptight old man is probably staring at my bags, crying over my memory. I'm not going back just to let him guilt-trip me.

The words crying over my memory snapped the last thread of Harrison's self-control.

He shot out of his leather chair so fast it slammed into the wall behind him.

He snatched the phone off the desk, bringing the microphone right to his mouth.

"Iris Cooper," Harrison snarled. His voice was laced with pure, lethal venom.

The background noise on the other end of the line seemed to stutter. Iris clearly hadn't expected him to be listening. Her breathing hitched.

Harrison didn't give her a second to recover.

"If you are not standing in my apartment in exactly one hour," Harrison said, his tone absolute ice, "I will have my security team pack every single bag you own and dump them into the Hudson River."

He paused, letting the threat hang in the air.

"And then," he added softly, "I will call the bank and place a freeze on the international wire transfers of your trust fund. Let's see how you pay for your little Soho parties then."

The threat of losing her money shattered her arrogant facade instantly.

You wouldn't dare! her mind screamed in panic.

"The choice is entirely yours, Iris," Harrison stated, his voice a low, vibrating hum of absolute authority, completely ignoring the frantic mental scream echoing in his skull. "One hour. The clock is ticking."

He slammed his thumb onto the red end-call button and tossed the phone back to Elias.

The office fell dead silent. Elias stared at his shoes, pretending he hadn't just witnessed his billionaire boss threaten his ex-wife over handbags.

Harrison straightened his cuffs. He grabbed his suit jacket off the back of his chair.

"Change the interview location," Harrison commanded as he walked toward the door. "I'm going to the penthouse. I will conduct the interviews myself."

Meanwhile, in the middle of the sweaty Soho club, Iris stared at her dead phone screen.

Her hands were shaking with absolute fury. A handsome man tried to wrap his arm around her waist, but she shoved him away violently.

She stomped out of the club, her twelve-inch heels clicking furiously against the pavement.

She cursed Harrison's entire bloodline in her head as she aggressively flagged down a yellow cab, screaming at the driver to take her to Tribeca.

Back in the back of his Maybach, Harrison watched the city blur past the tinted windows.

A dark, twisted sense of anticipation curled in his stomach.

He couldn't wait to see the look on her face when she walked through his door.