The acrid smell of burnt gunpowder from the airbags and sweet, leaking antifreeze fills the crushed cabin.

Elliana gasps for air. Pain radiates from every nerve ending. She is pinned between the mangled third-row seat and the caved-in roof.

Warm blood drips down her forehead, stinging her left eye.

Panic seizes her. She presses her left hand against her stomach. A dull, heavy ache pulses deep in her pelvis, but she feels no warm rush of blood.

From the front of the wreckage, Garrett lets out a sharp groan of pain. He shoves a deflated airbag off his chest, his left shoulder visibly bruised and bleeding from where it slammed into the center console.

"Garrett," Elliana croaks. Her throat is raw. "Help me."

Garrett freezes. He hears her. His shoulders tense, but he does not turn his head.

Instead, he violently kicks the center console. He rips away the twisted plastic, screaming for Cristina.

Cristina is sobbing hysterically in the front seat, clutching her chest where the seatbelt dug violently into her collarbone, a dark purple bruise already forming beneath her torn silk blouse. "I'm dying! Garrett, I'm dying!"

Garrett kicks the jammed passenger door open. He drags Cristina out of the wreckage, wrapping his arms around her.

He dives back in, grabs a stunned Blair from the floorboards, and sprints away from the vehicle.

Thick black smoke pours from the Escalade's crumpled hood. Orange sparks spit from the engine block.

Elliana lies in the twisted metal cage. She watches her husband carry his sister and nephew to safety, leaving her to burn.

The last shred of hope in her heart turns to ash. She is nothing to him. A decoy. A piece of trash.

Survival instinct overrides her grief. She braces her right hand against the crushed roof pillar and pushes with all her strength.

A sickening snap echoes in the cabin. Blinding agony shoots up her right arm.

Her wrist bones grind together. Her right hand, her drawing hand, falls limp and useless at her side.

Sirens wail in the distance, cutting through the smoke.

Firefighters swarm the vehicle. They use a crowbar to pry open the crushed tailgate.

As they strap her to a backboard and pull her out, Elliana turns her head. Through the flashing red lights, she sees Garrett gently draping his suit jacket over Cristina's shoulders.

Paramedics cut away her bloody trench coat in the back of the ambulance.

The ambulance races to Mount Sinai Hospital, bypassing the waiting room and rushing straight into the trauma bay.

Hours later, Elliana lies on a stiff hospital bed under harsh fluorescent lights.

A female doctor walks in, holding a chart. "It's a miracle, Mrs. Bruce. The fetal heartbeat is strong. The baby is fine."

Elliana covers her eyes with her good left hand. A ragged sob tears from her throat.

"But," the doctor continues, her voice dropping. "Your right scaphoid bone is shattered. Even with surgery, you may never regain the fine motor skills needed for professional drawing."

The words hit her like a second car crash. Her art. Her identity. Gone.

The door bursts open. Garrett rushes in. A small white bandage covers a scratch on his forehead.

He drops to his knees beside the bed. He grabs her left hand, his voice trembling with fake emotion. "Thank God you're alive, Ellie."

Elliana looks down at the man who left her to die. There is no love left in her eyes. Only a bottomless, freezing void of pure hatred.

The next morning, Garrett leaves the hospital to manage the PR fallout and check on Cristina.

Elliana pushes herself out of bed. She wears a thin hospital gown. Her right arm is encased in a heavy white plaster cast, strapped to her chest in a sling.

She shuffles down the quiet VIP corridor, her mind racing with survival strategies. Through the glass walls of the private lounge at the end of the hall, she spots a familiar profile. A man in a razor-sharp Tom Ford suit stands with his back to the door, barking into a Bluetooth earpiece.

"Move the offshore trust to the Cayman accounts by noon. I want her cheating bastard of a husband left with nothing but the lint in his pockets."

Elliana stops. She recognizes that aggressive posture and ruthless tone from the cover of last month's Forbes magazine. Dennis Nixon. The most cutthroat, bloodthirsty divorce attorney in Manhattan.

To fight a monster like Garrett, she needs a shark.

She pushes the heavy glass door open, stepping into the lounge, and taps her knuckles against the glass table.

Dennis spins around. His eyes are cold, predatory. He looks annoyed at the interruption. "This is a private area. Leave."

Elliana doesn't flinch. She looks him dead in the eye. "Garrett Bruce."

Dennis pauses. The annoyance vanishes, replaced by the sharp gleam of a predator smelling blood. The Bruce family is Wall Street royalty.

He ends his call and slowly looks her up and down.

"I want him ruined," Elliana says, her voice steady despite her pale face. "I want to take everything he loves."

Dennis lets out a dry, humorless laugh. "You're a battered wife in a hospital gown. You have no leverage. His lawyers will paint you as a hysterical, mentally unstable woman."

He pulls a matte black card from his inner pocket and slides it across the table. It has only a phone number on it.

"Don't call this number unless you have hard, irrefutable proof of financial fraud or criminal activity. Something that puts him in a cell."

Dennis walks past her, leaving her alone in the room.

Elliana grips the card in her left hand. She walks back to her room, picks up her phone, and dials her best friend, Audrey Keller.

Audrey is old money. She knows every dirty secret in the Upper East Side.

"Ellie? Where are you?"

Elliana quickly explains the crash. Audrey unleashes a string of vicious curses.

"Audrey, I need you to dig into Garrett and Cristina's business dealings. Right now."

"I'm coming to the hospital," Audrey demands.

"No. Garrett will suspect something. Just get the intel."

Elliana hangs up. She walks into the bathroom, tears the black business card into tiny pieces, and flushes it down the toilet. The number is burned into her memory.

That afternoon, Garrett returns. He carries a massive bouquet of lilies.

He sits on the edge of the bed and reaches out to stroke her hair. Elliana rolls her head to the side, pretending to wince in pain to avoid his touch.

Garrett sighs. "The doctors told me about your hand, Ellie. I'm so sorry."

He pulls a thick stack of papers from his briefcase. "To take the stress off you, I had the legal team draft an IP management agreement. My firm will handle The Prairie Fire for you."

Elliana's blood runs cold. He is making his move.

She blinks rapidly, letting tears pool in her eyes. "My head is spinning, Garrett. The words are blurry. I can't read this right now."

Garrett smiles, satisfied by her pathetic state. "Of course, darling. Rest. We have plenty of time."

At midnight, Garrett leaves the hospital, claiming a crisis with the European markets. Two massive bodyguards remain stationed outside Elliana's door.

A nurse in blue scrubs and a surgical mask pushes a medical cart down the hall. She nods to the guards and slips into the room.

The nurse locks the door, pulls down her mask, and exhales sharply. It is Audrey.

She reaches into the deep pocket of her scrubs and pulls out a heavily encrypted iPad. She shoves it into Elliana's good hand.

"Look at this. It's a leaked proof of next month's Vanity Fair."

Elliana stares at the screen. The headline screams in bold black letters: The Socialite's Masterpiece: Cristina Bruce and the Million-Dollar World of The Prairie Fire.

Below the text is a glossy photo of Cristina posing with a stylus, looking thoughtfully out a Parisian window.

Elliana's lungs tighten. She can't breathe.

"Garrett routed the IP through a Cayman Islands shell company," Audrey whispers fiercely. "He forged your signature on a deed of gift during one of your 'medication naps.' Hollywood is signing the contract with Cristina tomorrow."

Elliana's eyes burn. Three years of sketching until her fingers bled. Three years of pouring her soul onto paper.

That was why Garrett brought the contract today. He needed a fresh signature to legitimize the forged documents.

The rage inside her crystallizes into pure ice. She doesn't cry. She doesn't scream.

She reaches out with her left hand and traces the characters on the screen.

Audrey shivers. "Ellie, you're scaring me. What are we going to do?"

"I am going home," Elliana says. Her voice is dead.

"Are you insane? He's poisoning you!"

"Dennis Nixon needs proof," Elliana says, staring at the wall. "The drug logs, the original PSD files, the financial records. They are all in Garrett's penthouse. If I don't get them, I lose my baby, my book, and my freedom."

Audrey swallows hard. She nods, pulls her mask back up, and slips out of the room.

The next morning, Garrett walks in to find Elliana dressed in her own clothes.

She grabs his arm, her entire body trembling violently. "Get me out of here, Garrett. The monitors, the smells... I can't take it. I need to go home. I only feel safe with you."

She forces a sob, burying her face in his chest.

Garrett wraps his arms around her. The absolute submission feeds his massive ego. He kisses the top of her head. "Okay, sweetheart. I'll take you home."

By afternoon, the black Maybach pulls into the underground garage of the Upper East Side penthouse.

The private elevator doors open. Brenda stands in the foyer, her hands clasped in front of her apron.

Elliana meets the housekeeper's cold eyes. She leans heavily against Garrett and offers Brenda a weak, perfectly broken smile.

She is back in the monster's lair.