The firestorm was immediate. Brutal.
Within an hour, Lyra was no longer the wronged wife or the resilient mother-to-be. She was a disturbed, manipulative woman with a history of tearing families apart. The narrative Isolde had crafted was swallowed whole. The comments sections were a cesspool of judgment and hate.
Paparazzi descended on Zara’s apartment building like vultures, their cameras flashing against the windows. The siege had begun.
Zara fielded a call from the producers of `Starlight Serenade`. They were panicked. They spoke of morality clauses, of public perception. They were convening an emergency meeting to discuss dropping her from the competition.
Lyra heard none of it. She sat on Zara’s sofa, wrapped in a blanket, her eyes fixed on a single dark spot on the wall. She hadn’t spoken a word since she’d walked through the door.
Zara checked her pulse, her medical training overriding her fury. The stress was a direct threat to the pregnancy. “Lyra, you need to breathe,” she commanded softly. “Just breathe.”
***
Caspian saw the headline on a monitor in the Hawthorne Industries security hub. He read the first paragraph, then the second. He saw the scanned copies of the sealed documents.
His blood turned to ice.
This was the story Lyra had told him one night, years ago, her voice trembling in the dark. The story that had made him feel like her protector, the one that had forged a bond he later treated like glass and then smashed under his heel. He knew the truth. Every painful detail of it.
He walked back to the hospital, his movements stiff, his face a granite mask.
Isolde was waiting, her expression a perfect portrait of sympathy. “Caspian, darling, have you seen? It’s horrific. That poor woman… I had no idea her past was so troubled. It explains so much.”
He looked at her, at the feigned pity in her eyes, and felt a fury so cold and so absolute it nearly choked him. This was not about a lie or a scheme anymore. This was a violation. An act of profound cruelty that crossed a moral event horizon.
His mission was no longer about exposure. It was about justice. Absolute and unforgiving.
***
A text message lit up Lyra’s phone, which lay abandoned on the cushion beside her. Zara glanced at it. It was from Julian Croft.
She read it aloud, her voice firm. “It says, ‘They are trying to silence you because your voice is powerful. Don’t let them. We believe in the truth you sing, not the lies they write.’”
For the first time in hours, Lyra blinked. A single tear traced a path down her cheek. A small crack of light in an otherwise impenetrable darkness.
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