In the gilt-framed mirror, Venessa watched her own face transform. The tears froze mid-fall. The trembling stilled. Her reflection became something terrifying in its absolute calm—a mask of polished ice over a churning sea.
So he was here.
Somewhere beyond these walls, Damon Krane was holding court, no doubt swirling that damn bourbon he loved, his laugh deep and easy as he charmed his way through another crowd of sycophants. He'd be leaning against some grand piano, already halfway into another woman's bed, halfway out of their shared history.
He wasn't thinking about how she'd memorized the way his lashes caught the light at dawn.
He wasn't remembering how she'd traced the scar on his shoulder after their first fight.
He certainly wasn't haunted by four years of her love—poured freely, wasted completely, like vintage wine spilled for a traitor's toast.
And Venessa?
Venessa was learning the lesson no finishing school had ever taught her, the truth no amount of money or manners could shield her from:
Love wasn't a fairytale.
It was just another luxury illusion—sold in limited editions and pretty packaging, designed to keep girls like her quiet while the world took what it wanted.
A lie.
A sugar-coated cage.
And tonight, the cage door had swung wide open.
But the bird inside?
She didn't fly.
She just stood there—wings clipped, heart bleeding, staring out into a freedom that looked an awful lot like exile.
Venessa snatched up her purse with fingers that didn't quite stop trembling. The gift she'd wrapped—the last relic of her old life disguised in tissue and ribbon—was clutched tight to her side like a shield. It had been meant for her best friend.
Now it felt like a joke.
She didn't look back as she strode through the ballroom when Margot's laughter chased after her like shards of broken glass.
Not when the whispers rose in her wake, a hissing tide of poor Venessa and what did she expect?
Not even when she passed the grand piano where Damon stood, his hand resting possessively on some socialite's bare shoulder, his smile never faltering as Venessa walked by—as if she were already a ghost.
The night air hit her like a slap, crisp and bracing, scented with rain and the faintest hint of blooming jasmine from the hotel's gardens.
A doorman stepped forward. "Shall I call your car, Miss Ellison?"
Miss Ellison.
Not Mrs. Krane.
Never Mrs. Krane.
The name sliced sharper than any of the whispered barbs inside.
She froze.
"I… I came in a cab," she murmured, the words feeling oddly foreign in her throat.
Did he forget that? Or its his final jab hidden in logistics.
She didn't remember being rude to the staff here. Not ever. She always smiled, said thank you, tipped well. But now—now she wasn't sure. Was she being paranoid? Was this what falling from grace felt like? Second-guessing your own kindness? Imagining slights in every blink?
Her fingers curled tighter around the box, knuckles pale. She gave a brittle nod.
"No need," she said softly. "I'll walk."
And she stepped out into the night like a ghost leaving her own funeral. Then, with a slow, deliberate motion, she dropped it into the nearest trash bin.
The sound of it hitting the bottom was softer than she expected.
And with that, Venessa Ellison stepped off the curb and into the neon-lit night, leaving behind the glittering wreckage of a future that had never really been hers.
.....
The alarm shrieked at 5:00 AM.
Six months after, Venessa still wasn't used to it.
In her past life, mornings were a gentle luxury: the soft hiss of a coffee machine prepped by someone paid to care, fresh newspapers arranged just so, sunlight filtered through silk curtains, and the divine right to wake only when her body felt like it.
Now? Now the alarm was a screaming banshee dragging her out of dreams that still smelled like Chanel sheets and betrayal.
She groaned, fumbling for the off button with fingers too tired to cooperate.
Lesson One: Time waits for no heiress.
The first time she'd been late to the café, her manager docked her pay. The second time, he'd fired her.
"This isn't a goddamn charity, princess," he'd sneered.
Since then, she'd set three alarms. Backups to the backup. And still, she woke every morning feeling like time was laughing in her face.
She pulled herself out of bed—an old mattress on the floor, no frame, no grace—and shuffled toward another double shift.
But it wasn't just her life that had collapsed.
It was the whole damn house of Ellison cards. Everyone suffered a blow, the whole Ellison clan had gone down like a luxury yacht with a hole in its side—elegant, dramatic, and utterly unsalvageable.
Her father, Richard Ellison, once a titan of Manhattan real estate, had been indicted for fraud, tax evasion, and securities manipulation. He claimed innocence until the last flashbulb faded. Now he sat in a white-collar holding facility, swapping stock tips with ex-hedge fund managers and writing letters no one read. The bankruptcy had taken more than his fortune—it had taken his will to fight.
Her stepmother, Clarisse, fled to Europe the moment the news hit—"just for a wellness retreat"—and conveniently forgot to return. Rumour had it she was dating a much-younger tennis pro in Monaco and legally changed her last name to something unpronounceable but untraceable.
Jane Ellison: Once the darling of indie cinema, now reduced to cameos in straight-to-streaming films no one watched. Her third husband—the one who lived in the guesthouse—had filed for divorce the moment the bankruptcy hit the papers. These days, she floated between friends' couches, her IMDb page gathering dust, her Instagram a graveyard of #ThrowbackThursday posts to better days.
Laila's contractual marriage to the tone-deaf billionaire had dissolved the second the Ellison name became toxic. The tabloids had a field day: "From Open Marriage to Open Wounds: Laila Ellison's Latest Flop.
Megan Ellison, the Only Sane One ,The studious one, the practical one. She'd traded her ballet slippers for spreadsheets, burying herself in business textbooks, determined to salvage what was left of the family name. But even she couldn't outrun the whispers at school: "Isn't her sister the one who got dumped at her own engagement?"
And lastly, the youngest survivors of the Ellison downfall—the twins, born the day their mother died bringing them into the world.
The twins were Evelyn Ellison's final gift to the family—and the costliest.
Dina and Davis entered the world screaming, their tiny fists clenched as if already fighting for survival, while their mother left it in silence. The doctors called it an unforeseen complication. The tabloids, with their flair for cruel myth-making, labeled it the beginning of the Ellison curse. From that moment on, the family's gilded empire began to crack—first quietly, then catastrophically—until it all came crashing down, as if her death had opened a door that let the ruin in.
Because after that day, the dominoes fell with cruel precision:
Six months later: Richard's first bad investment (the lithium mines that didn't exist)
Two years after: Jane's third divorce (and the leaked video that killed her career)
Three years on: Laila's "accidental" nude shoot (and the cocaine rumor that may or may not have been true)
And now, when journalists chronicled the family's downfall, they always began with the twins.
"It started when Evelyn Ellison died in childbirth," they wrote, as if two nine-year-olds were the original sin.
Davis had started getting into fights at school. "Your sisters are gold diggers," the boys taunted and worst called his sisters "washed-up, wasted, or wicked." He hated being called an Ellison and once asked if he could just be "Dave." He'd started biting his nails again..
Dina, fragile and too perceptive for her age, had stopped speaking altogether. Sometime Venessa find her still tucked herself into bed whispering prayers for everyone—especially Venessa. She drew family portraits where they all smiled, even Dad, even Damon, still in his tux.
Since only one Ellison worked the counter at 7 a.m., refilling drip coffee for bankers who used to know her name.
Venessa, who had once been the crown jewel.
Venessa, who was now just a girl with no wedding ring, no trust fund, and a thousand-yard stare.