Zayn Maverick didn't stay to witness the aftermath of his retaliation. He didn't offer a key, an apology, or a second glance. With the cold, efficient grace of a man purging a memory, Zayn simply vanished.
He turned his back on the shivering officer and retreated into the obsidian shadows of the penthouse foyer, the heavy security doors hissing shut with a finality that sounded like a tomb closing.
Joshua lay slumped against the cold tire of his cruiser, the gravel biting into his palms. His world was a kaleidoscope of throbbing purple and white-hot static.
Through the haze of nausea, he watched the space where Zayn had stood.
"You..." Joshua croaked, his voice a broken thread of sound. "You'll pay... for that. I swear... on the Ashford name... you'll pay."
But the only answer was the distant hum of the penthouse's climate control. The "mess" was left for the night to reclaim.
Inside the master suite, the air was heavy with the scent of expensive silk and the faint, lingering aroma of a father's protective desperation.
Isidore Davenant lay on the massive, ivory-draped bed. He wasn't alone. Curled beside him was Julian, his son—the only anchor in a world that had spent the last week trying to tear Isidore apart. The child's breathing was a soft, rhythmic lullaby, a stark contrast to the erratic, thundering pulse still vibrating in Isidore's neck.
The accusations, the digital vitriol, and the coppery scent of the blood on his knuckles earlier today had left Isidore feeling fractured. He looked at Julian's calm, innocent face, and for a moment, the iron-willed Isidore felt a terrifying urge to simply disappear. He closed his eyes, his long lashes casting jagged shadows against his pale cheekbones, trying to force the "lava" in his veins to cool.
The heavy oak door creaked open. The clinical scent of antiseptic and peppermint signaled the arrival of the only man who dared to defy Isidore's commands.
Maurice stepped into the dim light. He looked weary, his medical bag a heavy weight in his hand, his emerald eyes sharp and unforgiving.
"I already told you this morning," Maurice began, his voice a low-frequency rasp of irritation. "Stay home. Rest. But no. A Davenant has to rule, even when his body is a war zone."
Isidore didn't open his eyes. "Leave me alone, Maurice. I am not in the mood for a lecture."
"I would love to leave you alone," Maurice countered, his steps silent as he approached the bed. "But you've made that impossible. Your telemetry is a disaster. Now, sit up. I need to examine the damage you've done to yourself."
"I said I am fine," Isidore hissed, his voice a serrated blade. "Get out."
Maurice didn't flinch. He had spent years navigating the labyrinthine tempers of this family. He reached down, his fingers firm as he gripped Isidore's wrist. As he pulled Isidore's arm toward the light, the physician let out a sharp, audible gasp.
Isidore's hands—the hands of a man who was supposed to be the pinnacle of aristocratic refinement—were a ruin. The knuckles were split and swollen, the skin a mottled palette of angry crimson and bruised indigo. The dried blood from the boardroom confrontation was crusted in the creases of his skin like dark rust.
"How did you end up like this?" Maurice asked, his voice losing its edge, replaced by a haunting, clinical sorrow. "Isidore, look at these. You fought like a common brawler."
"I don't want to talk about it," Isidore murmured, his head turning away, his jaw tightening.
Maurice didn't ask again. He moved with a visceral, practiced efficiency. He opened his bag, the metallic clink of instruments sounding like small bells in the quiet room.
He didn't wait for permission. Maurice prepared a syringe, the liquid glinting like liquid silver in the lamplight. Before Isidore could protest, Maurice pressed the needle into the Omega's shoulder.
"Maurice! What—"
"Quiet," Maurice commanded. "It's a sedative and a blood-pressure stabilizer. You're going to sleep, Isidore, before your heart decides to stop on its own."
Maurice then turned his attention to the hands. He cleaned the splits with a cooling antiseptic, his touch surprisingly tender despite his earlier anger. He wrapped the knuckles in clean, white gauze, the bandages stark and bright against the dark sheets.
By the time the last strip of tape was secured, Isidore's resistance had vanished. The medication pulled him down into the depths of a forced, heavy sleep. His breathing slowed, his features finally losing the tension of the week.
Maurice stood over him, looking at the two Davenants—one sleeping in innocence, the other in a chemical haze. He sighed, a sound that carried the weight of a thousand secrets.
"If you had just stayed home," Maurice whispered to the shadows, "none of this would have happened. We are all just animals in suits, aren't we, cousin?"
Meanwhile at the, The dressing room of Kay Lockwood was a sanctuary of gilded mirrors and artificial light, yet it felt more like a mausoleum than a place of beauty.
A week of sleeplessness had carved jagged shadows beneath his chestnut eyes. The blonde superstar, usually the pinnacle of porcelain perfection, stared at his reflection with a visceral disgust. His long, golden hair was a tangled halo, and his skin looked translucent, like parchment stretched too thin over a fracturing soul.
"I look like a clown," Kay whispered, his voice a dry rasp. He buried his face in his trembling hands, the silk sleeves of his designer robe fluttering like wounded wings. "I am a monster. A beautiful, hollow monster."
Behind him, his personal bodyguard—a man built like a monolith of granite—shifted uneasily. He had watched the star's slow descent into neurosis with a mixture of professional concern and quiet, unrequited devotion.
"Stop blaming yourself, Mr. Lockwood," the bodyguard murmured, his voice a low rumble. "You were caught in a tide you couldn't control."
Kay lunged toward him, his movements frantic and bird-like. He wiped a stray tear from his cheek with a jagged motion.
"Look at me! I look like a disaster! What should I do? If I keep rotting like this from the inside out, I won't be a star anymore. I'll just be... a ghost."
The bodyguard stood his ground, maintaining a respectful distance, though his eyes shimmered with a protective heat. "You are always perfect.
It's the routine that's broken, not you. Do not worry. It has been a week, and the veil remains intact. No one has found the truth."
Kay didn't seem to hear him. He whipped his long, blonde hair back, the strands catching the light in a way that made the bodyguard catch his breath.
Kay turned toward the floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked the city—the same city that currently worshipped his image while condemning the Davenants.
He felt the weight of the secret, the cold memory of the knife, and the way Ansel Adams had looked at him like a tool rather than a human being.
Then, he began to sing.
It wasn't a rehearsed performance for a studio. It was a raw, haunting melody that rose from the depths of his depression, a crystalline vibrato that seemed to vibrate the very glass of the window.
"I should have never stepped into this masquerade,
Where the lights are blinding and the shadows are made.
I wore the crown of a hero, played the saint on the screen,
But the steel was real, and my hands are unclean."
The bodyguard's eyes widened. He had heard Kay sing a thousand times, but never like this—never with this much theatrical tragedy.
"Now I am grounded by the weight of my heart,
Tearing the script of my life completely apart.
I should be the gentle, the kind, and the true,
Not the source of the harm that I brought unto you."
Kay pushed his hair over one shoulder, his body swaying with a tragic, rhythmic grace. His robe fluttered around his ankles like the plumage of a fallen angel.
He moved away from the window, his voice rising in a desperate crescendo of penance.
"I am a monster in a house made of glass,
Watching the ghosts of my victims slowly pass.
Once I was the sun that the world came to see,
Now I am drowning in a dark, silent sea."
He fell to his knees in the center of the plush rug, his eyes fixed on the ceiling as if pleading with a God he felt he had forsaken.
"Oh, forgive me for the sin that I swore to keep,
In the hours of the night when I cannot find sleep.
I won't step into that hell, not a moment more,
I want to be the guilty one, knocking at the door."
His voice dropped to a heart-wrenching whisper, the final notes lingering in the air like smoke.
"Let me save those I've harmed, let me speak the truth,
Before I wither away in the vanity of my youth..."
The silence that followed was heavy, broken only by the sound of Kay's shallow, ragged breathing. He stayed on the floor, his head bowed, looking fragile and utterly broken.
Suddenly, the sound of slow, rhythmic clapping broke the trance.
Kay flinched, his head snapping up to see his bodyguard standing there, his face flushed with an intense, raw admiration.
"That was..." the bodyguard started, his voice thick with emotion. "That was magnificent, Mr. Lockwood. Better than any recording I've ever heard."
Kay's pale cheeks suddenly flared with a soft, peach-colored blush. The intensity of his guilt was momentarily bypassed by a surge of pure, human embarrassment. He looked down at the floor, his fingers tracing the patterns in the rug.
"You... you don't need to do that," Kay whispered, his voice small.
"But it was the truth," the bodyguard insisted, taking a step closer, his mismatched admiration palpable in the small room.
"If that is what the truth sounds like, then perhaps it isn't as terrifying as you think."
Kay looked up at him, his eyes shimmering with a new, dangerous resolve. The song had purged something in him.
He realized that he couldn't stay in this digital purgatory forever. He was a monster, yes, but even monsters could find a way to be the hero of their own ending.
"I have to do it," Kay murmured, more to himself than the guard. "I have to be the guilty one. Or I'll never sing again."
Calder Ashborne, the man who had served as Kay's shadow for years, finally stepped out of the periphery.
He moved with the slow, deliberate grace of a predator, crouching down before the fallen star. He didn't just reach out; he took Kay's trembling hands into his own—calloused, massive, and steady.
Kay's breath hitched in surprise. As Calder stood, he didn't release his grip, effortlessly lifting Kay from the floor until they were eye-to-eye.
"If you have made your choice," Calder murmured, his voice a low-frequency hum that seemed to ground Kay's frantic energy. "Then you should do exactly what your heart is telling you. No more scripts, Kay. Just the truth."
Kay looked away, his cheeks burning with a soft, peach-colored blush as his hands remained swallowed by Calder's warmth. He nodded once, a sharp, decisive motion. "I will. I'll do it. I won't be his puppet anymore."
At the investigation headquarters, the automatic glass doors hissed open to reveal Joshua Ashford.
He didn't walk in with his usual, swaggering confidence. Instead, he moved with a stiff, jerky gait, his face a ghastly shade of pale, and his smile looking more like a grimace of a dying man.
Zephyr was standing by the central terminal, his silver-rimmed glasses catching the harsh fluorescent light. He looked up, his brow furrowing instantly.
"Joshua?" Zephyr's voice was sharp. "Did something happen? You look like you've walked through a minefield."
Joshua forced a weird, strained smile, his pupils dilated from the residual trauma of Zayn's kick. "To me? Oh, please. No. Everything is fine. Just a little... indigestion."