Jenna Jarvis POV

Silence is usually a luxury in New York, but in the penthouse, it felt like a shroud.

Corbett had rushed Ivana to the emergency room at 3:00 AM because her "panic attack" had escalated into hyperventilation the moment I refused to grovel further.

He didn't ask me to come.

He didn't look back.

Now, sunlight was bleeding through the floor-to-ceiling windows, illuminating the museum I lived in.

Beige sofas. Beige walls. Abstract art that meant nothing-canvas voids devoid of soul.

It was Ivana's taste. Corbett had let her "redecorate" six months into our marriage because she said the colors soothed her trauma.

I walked into the master bedroom.

The bed was unmade. Ivana's pillow was still on the chaise, indented from her head.

I picked it up. It smelled of her perfume-a cheap, floral scent that failed to mask the underlying odor of decay she seemed to carry in her pores.

I threw it on the floor.

Corbett had told me to "clean up my act."

He told me to get rid of the "clutter" in my studio because the smell of the essential oils was bothering Ivana.

I walked to my studio down the hall.

Rows of amber bottles lined the shelves. My father's legacy.

Sandalwood from Mysore. Rose from Grasse. Oud from a supplier who had been dead for ten years.

These weren't just smells. They were memories. They were currency.

I didn't throw them away.

I began to pack.

I wrapped each bottle in velvet, placing them into nondescript cardboard boxes.

I wasn't cleaning up. I was extracting the only valuable thing left in this marriage: myself.

My phone buzzed. A notification from a gossip site.

Underboss Corbett Ewing Spotted at Le Petit Chou with Mystery Blonde. Comforting the Grieving Family?

I clicked the link.

The photo was timestamped an hour ago.

They weren't at the hospital.

They were at a high-end patisserie on the Upper East Side.

Corbett was feeding Ivana a macaron. His hand was cupping her jaw.

He looked devoted. He looked like a husband. Just not mine.

I felt a crack in my chest, a physical fracture running deep through the bone.

I called the butler, heavy boxes in my arms.

"Take these to the loading dock," I said. "Donation pickup."

It wasn't a donation. My contact from the Solomon family would be there in ten minutes.

By the time Corbett returned, the studio was bare.

He walked in, looking exhausted but self-righteous.

I was in the living room, standing over the incinerator chute in the utility closet.

I held a black trash bag.

"Where is Ivana?" I asked.

"She's resting in the guest wing," he said, loosening his tie. "The doctor said she needs absolute quiet. You were cruel last night, Jenna."

"I saw the photos," I said. "The macarons looked delicious."

He stiffened. "She needed sugar. Her blood pressure dropped."

"Feeding her by hand restores blood pressure? I must have missed that in medical school."

He glared at me. "Stop it. Stop being so jealous of a broken woman."

He noticed the bag in my hand. "What is that?"

"Our honeymoon albums," I said. "And the wedding video."

His eyes widened. "Jenna, don't be dramatic."

"You asked me to clean up the clutter," I said. "I'm removing the things that no longer exist."

I opened the chute. The metal clanged.

"Jenna, stop!"

I dropped the bag.

It vanished into the dark throat of the building.

Corbett stared at the empty space, his jaw working. "We will talk about this later. Right now, I need peace."

He walked to the kitchen counter and picked up a small white box.

"I brought you some," he said, his tone shifting, trying to pivot back to the benevolent provider. "Pistachio. Your favorite."

He held out a green macaron.

It was a peace offering. A bribe.

"Did she apologize?" I asked. "For accusing me of strangling her?"

Corbett sighed, rubbing his temples. "She doesn't remember saying it. She was in a fugue state. You have to be the bigger person, Jenna."

"I'm tired of being the bigger person, Corbett. I'm shrinking."

"Just eat the damn cookie," he said, thrusting it at me. "I'm trying here."

I looked at him. I looked at the cookie.

If I refused, we would fight for hours. If I ate it, maybe he would leave me alone long enough to finalize my exit.

I took the macaron. I took a bite.

The taste hit my tongue instantly.

Sweet. Nutty.

And then, bitter.

My throat seized. It felt like someone had wrapped a barbed wire noose around my windpipe and yanked.

Almond paste.

I was deathly allergic to almonds. Corbett knew this. He used to carry my EpiPen in his suit pocket on our first dates.

I dropped the cookie. I clawed at my throat.

"Jenna?" Corbett frowned. "What's wrong?"

"Al...mond..." I wheezed, falling to my knees. The room began to spin. Black spots danced in my vision.

"It's pistachio," he said, confused. "I ordered pistachio."

Suddenly, a scream ripped from the guest wing.

"Corbett! They're posting hateful comments about me! Help!"

Ivana.

I was gasping for air, my lungs turning to stone. I reached out a hand toward him, grabbing his pant leg.

Help me.

Corbett looked down at me, then toward the hallway where Ivana was screaming about Instagram comments.

He hesitated.

For one second, he looked at his dying wife.

Then he pulled his leg away from my grasp.

"I'll be right back," he said. "Where is your pen? Just... use your pen."

He turned and ran toward the guest wing.

He ran toward the noise.

I lay on the floor, my vision tunneling.

He left me.

He left me dying on the floor to comfort a woman upset about cyberbullying.

I dragged myself across the carpet, my fingernails breaking against the floor.

My purse. The kitchen counter.

I couldn't breathe. My heart was hammering a chaotic rhythm against my ribs.

I reached up, my hand shaking violently, and tipped my bag over.

Lipstick. Keys.

The yellow cap of the EpiPen.

I grabbed it. I didn't have the strength to check the dosage.

I swung my arm and stabbed the needle into my thigh, right through my jeans.

The click was the only sound in the room.

The adrenaline hit my system like a freight train.

I gasped, a horrible, ragged sucking of air.

I lay there, shaking, tears streaming down my face, listening to Corbett in the other room soothing Ivana.

"Shh, don't cry. It's just the internet. I'll have the accounts banned."

He was protecting her feelings while I fought to keep my heart beating.

I closed my eyes, and the last thread of love I had for Corbett Ewing snapped.

Jenna Jarvis POV

The hospital ceiling was a grid of white tiles, a sterile abacus counting down minutes of a life I felt slipping through my fingers.

I tried to swallow, but my throat seized; it felt as though I had swallowed a handful of razor blades.

I had driven myself to the ER-or rather, I had stumbled into a cab, rasped the address, and collapsed in the backseat before the driver could even ask if I was okay.

I woke up alone.

There were no flowers. No husband pacing the floor. Just the rhythmic, indifferent beep of the cardiac monitor.

I reached for the phone on the bedside table, my movements sluggish. My fingers were bruised from where the IV had been inserted previously.

I dialed Corbett.

It rang four times.

"Hello?"

It wasn't Corbett.

"Ivana," I croaked. My voice was a wreck, a jagged ruin of sound.

"Oh, Jenna," she purred. "Corbett is in the shower. He's so stressed. You really shouldn't have caused such a scene over a cookie. It was very dramatic."

"Put him on," I whispered, gripping the plastic receiver until my knuckles turned white.

"He's busy," she said, dismissively. "We have a meeting with the florist. For the gala. You know how important appearances are."

She hung up.

I stared at the phone, listening to the dial tone hum like a flatline.

Rage is usually described as hot, like fire. But this rage was cold. It was absolute zero, freezing the tears in my ducts before they could fall.

I ripped the IV out of my arm. A sharp sting was followed by a warm trickle as blood dripped onto the pristine white sheets, blooming like a stark red poppy.

I didn't care.

I dressed in my ruined clothes and walked out of the room, using the wall for support.

"Ma'am, you can't leave! You're Against Medical Advice!" a nurse called out from the station, half-rising from her chair.

"I'm saving my own life," I rasped, and kept walking without looking back.

I took a cab back to the penthouse.

When I entered, the air smelled overwhelmingly of lilies-the scent of funerals.

Corbett was in the living room, arranging a massive bouquet of white lilies in a crystal vase. He looked the picture of the grieving husband, minus the grief.

He looked up, startled. "Jenna? The hospital said you left."

"I did."

He rushed over, trying to hug me. I stepped back, putting a clear three feet of distance between us.

"Don't," I said.

"I'm sorry," he said, looking pained, though whether it was guilt or inconvenience, I couldn't tell. "I didn't know it was almond. The box said pistachio. It was a mistake."

"Leaving me on the floor wasn't a mistake, Corbett. It was a choice."

He flinched. "Ivana was hysterical. I thought you had your pen. I knew you could handle it. You're strong, Jenna. She's... she's not."

"I'm strong because I have to be," I said, my voice gaining a steely edge. "Because my husband is weak."

His face hardened. "Watch your mouth."

"I want a divorce."

The words hung in the air, heavy and final.

Corbett laughed. It was a dry, incredulous sound. "You can't divorce me. We are married. You are a Ewing. Nobody leaves."

"Watch me."

"Jenna, stop this," he said, his voice lowering into that reasonable tone he used to manipulate board members. "I'm trying to make it up to you. Look at the flowers. And... I have a solution for the studio issue."

My stomach dropped. "What solution?"

"Ivana needs a space," he said. "For her art therapy. Her therapist suggested it."

"And?"

"And your studio has the best light."

"No," I said, panic fluttering in my chest. "That is my work. My equipment. My father's organ."

"You packed it all up anyway," he said, gesturing to the empty shelves. "I saw the boxes were gone. You don't need the furniture."

"The perfume organ is an antique. It's built into the wall. You can't move it."

"I hired specialists," he said.

A loud thud came from down the hall.

I ran.

I ran past him, down the corridor, to my sanctuary.

Two men in blue jumpsuits were wrestling the massive oak workbench-the organ where my father had taught me how to blend jasmine and cedar-through the doorframe.

Wood splintered.

A deep gouge appeared on the side of the desk, exposing the raw, pale wood beneath the varnish.

"Stop!" I screamed, grabbing the arm of one of the movers. "Put it down!"

"Mrs. Ewing, please," the man said, looking nervous. "Mr. Ewing gave the order."

I turned to Corbett, who had followed me at a leisurely pace.

"Tell them to stop," I begged. My pride was gone. This was my soul they were dragging across the floor. "Corbett, please. It's all I have left of him."

Corbett looked at the desk, then at the empty room that would soon be filled with Ivana's chaotic, amateurish paints.

"It's just furniture, Jenna," he said softly. "Ivana needs this. Let it go."

He signaled the men.

They heaved. The leg of the desk caught on the doorframe and snapped with a sickening crack.

It sounded like a bone breaking.

I didn't scream.

I just stood there, watching my heritage being hauled away to the trash, while my husband supervised the demolition of my heart.

Jenna Jarvis POV

The movers left a trail of sawdust and scratches on the hardwood floor, jagged scars that mirrored the ones inside me.

I stood at the top of the stairs, gripping the banister as I watched the heavy oak desk disappear into the freight elevator.

Ivana stood at the bottom, wearing a smirk that could cut glass.

She caught my eye and winked.

It wasn't about the room. It wasn't about the light.

It was about taking.

She wanted to hollow me out until I was nothing but a shell, a husk, just so she could step inside and wear my life like a coat.

Corbett wouldn't look at me. He turned his back, feigning intense interest in a painting on the wall, his shoulders slumped in that familiar posture of cowardice.

That night, he came into our bed.

He lay on the edge, his back to me. The distance between us was only inches, but it felt like an ocean of ice.

"She's happy now," he whispered into the dark, his voice strained. "This is the last thing, Jenna. I promise. Once she settles in, things will go back to normal."

I didn't answer.

Normal was a myth. Normal was dead.

The next morning, I found them in the dining room.

Ivana was spreading sketches across the table, deliberately covering my breakfast setting.

"I'm thinking of painting the walls black," she said, biting into a piece of toast that had been on my plate. "To reflect my inner turmoil."

She saw me and smiled, though the expression didn't reach her eyes. "Oh, Jenna. Good morning. I have something to tell you."

My blood ran cold. "What?"

"I was moving some of those old boxes you left in the closet," she said breezily. "To make room for my easels."

"I moved all my boxes," I said.

"Not the small one," she said. "The one with the little crystal bottle. It was wrapped in velvet."

My heart stopped.

The 1928 Guerlain Djedi. My father's most prized possession. The last sealed bottle in existence. He had saved it for my wedding day, but I had never opened it because marrying Corbett felt like a funeral.

"Where is it?" I asked, my voice trembling.

"Oops," she said.

I didn't wait.

I sprinted to the guest room-my old studio.

The smell hit me before I even crossed the threshold.

Dry, animalic, somber. The scent of ancient grief.

The bottle lay shattered on the floor near the window. The dark amber liquid was soaking into the pristine white carpet, a stain that looked like dried blood.

"No," I whimpered.

I fell to my knees.

I reached for the shards, desperate to scoop up the liquid, to save even a drop of my father's memory.

The glass sliced into my palms.

I didn't feel the pain. I only felt the loss.

"It slipped," Ivana said from the doorway. Her voice was flat, bored.

I turned on her, my hands dripping with blood and perfume.

"You threw it!" I screamed. "You did this on purpose! You monster!"

Corbett stepped in front of her, shielding her from me.

"Jenna! Look at yourself!" he shouted. "You're bleeding all over the carpet!"

"She broke it!" I sobbed, holding up my lacerated hands. "It was my father's! She knew!"

"It was an accident!" Corbett yelled back. "Why do you always have to villainize her? She was trying to clean up!"

He looked at my bleeding hands with disgust, not concern.

"You're hysterical," he said. "Go clean yourself up. You're scaring her."

I looked at him.

He was standing over the wreckage of my father's legacy, protecting the woman who destroyed it.

He wasn't just weak. He was complicit.

I stood up.

I wiped my bloody hands on my jeans, leaving dark, crimson streaks against the denim.

The scent of Djedi was overwhelming, a funeral shroud wrapping around us.

"You're right," I said, my voice suddenly calm, terrifyingly steady. "I am scaring her. But not nearly enough."