Ella sat at the far corner of her new studio—the one Leon "gifted" anonymously through layers of shell companies.
She wasn't stupid.
She knew his handprints were all over it.
Her fingers trembled slightly as she scrolled through the latest email: an industry magazine suddenly reversing its blacklisting of her, praising her "resilience" and "underrated talent."
She slammed the laptop shut.
Across the city, Leon watched from a distance in his car, gripping the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles turned bone-white.
He hadn't spoken to her in three days. Not directly.
But every path she walked had been cleared.
And she knew it.
She wanted to scream.
Because how dare he think he could fix this with gifts and favors?
She didn't want his power.
She wanted him to suffer what she did—alone, voiceless, crawling through mud with no one to pull her out.
And yet…
Every time she reached for something, it was already there.
Smoothed out. Prepared.
Like he'd memorized her before he lost himself.
He was no longer a storm raging through her life.
He was a silent tide—pulling her back, inch by inch, until she woke up drowning again.
She hated him for it.
And she hated herself more for noticing the warmth in the small things: the heated tea in her studio, the security guard with no name who always saluted her, the unspoken protection in a city full of knives.
That night, she walked into the hallway to confront the guard.
"Tell your boss," she spat, "that I don't want his charity."
The man didn't flinch.
Instead, he stepped aside—revealing Leon behind him, eyes hollow, dressed in black.
"I didn't come to beg," he said quietly.
"I came to return something you left behind."
He held out a small velvet box.
Inside—
Her necklace.
The one she'd thrown into the ocean three years ago, the day she swore she'd cut him out of her life.