His words hung in the air, a death sentence delivered with casual indifference. He didn' t remember my allergy; he dismissed it as theatrics. The man who once held my hand through every sniffle and sneeze now threatened to force-feed me the very thing that could kill me. In that moment, a switch flipped inside me. If he wanted theatrics, I would give him a show.

I snatched the spoon from his hand, my own trembling with a strange mix of despair and defiance. "Fine," I rasped, my voice barely audible. "If this is what you want, Dayton. If this is how you want to remember me." I spooned the creamy bisque into my mouth, chewing slowly, deliberately, the taste of the ocean a bitter irony on my tongue. Cassidy watched, her eyes wide with a mixture of shock and morbid curiosity. Dayton stared, his expression unreadable, perhaps surprised by my sudden compliance.

Within minutes, my throat began to constrict. My skin prickled, then burned. My breath hitched, each inhale a desperate struggle. A fiery itch spread across my body, and my vision blurred. I tried to stand, but my legs buckled. I crashed back onto the bed, gasping, clawing at my throat. It was a familiar terror, but this time, it was self-inflicted, a desperate plea to a man who no longer cared.

Panic seized Cassidy. "Dayton! What's happening to her?" she shrieked, her voice laced with genuine fear. The performance was unraveling.

Dayton, too, looked alarmed. His face paled as he watched me writhe, my body convulsing, my skin erupting in angry red welts. "Nurse! Get a doctor! STAT!" he bellowed, his voice finally losing its cold control.

The room erupted into chaos. Doctors and nurses swarmed in, their faces grim. Needles, tubes, frantic whispers. I faded in and out of consciousness, the world a blurry, pain-filled mess. I heard fragments of conversation: "Anaphylactic shock... severe reaction... barely clinging to life." My self-inflicted wound had almost succeeded.

When I finally stabilized, bruised and barely clinging to life, Dayton was nowhere to be seen. Cassidy, however, was back, her usual smug self, though a faint tremor in her hand betrayed her previous panic. "You really are determined to cause trouble, aren't you, Brynn?" she hissed, her voice low and furious. "But it won't work. Dayton is mine."

A week later, I was discharged, a hollow shell of my former self. My body ached, but my mind was clearer, sharper than ever. I had witnessed the depth of his cruelty, the extent of her malice. There was no going back.

The Reed family, ever fond of appearances, threw a "welcome home" dinner, a thinly veiled spectacle of their continued generosity towards me. It was held in their grand dining hall, a cavernous space filled with the clinking of silverware and the hushed whispers of society's elite. I was forced to attend, a living ghost at my own funeral.

Cassidy, radiant in a shimmering gown, took center stage. She held up a small, intricately carved wooden bird. "This, my darlings," she announced, her voice tinkling, "is a gift for Brynn. A symbol of transformation, of overcoming adversity." She smiled, a cat-like smirk playing on her lips. "Some say black birds are bad omens, but I say, they represent the ability to shed old skin and embrace a new, brighter future." She placed the bird in front of me, its dark, unnatural presence mocking me. It was an old superstition, meant to signify bad luck, death. A veiled threat.

I sat there, my face impassive, my hands clasped tightly in my lap. I was a puppet, forced to dance to their twisted tune. The guests exchanged knowing glances, their whispers like venom in my ears. Crazy. Unstable. Desperate.

"Brynn, darling, are you quite alright?" Cassidy asked, her voice laced with mock concern. "You look a little... pale. Perhaps you should eat more. This duck confit is simply divine." She pushed a plate towards me, her eyes glinting.

I merely nodded, picking at my food, acutely aware of the eyes on me. This was her arena, her stage. I wouldn't give her the satisfaction of a reaction.

Then came the pièce de résistance. A large flat-screen TV descended from the ceiling, displaying a series of "candid" photos. Photos of me, looking disheveled, distraught, crying in public. Photos digitally altered to make it appear as if I were screaming at innocent bystanders, throwing things, acting erratically. A montage of my lowest moments, twisted into a public spectacle of my supposed madness.

A collective gasp rippled through the room. Then, whispers turned into murmurs, then into outright condemnation. "She really is unstable." "Poor Dayton, what he's had to endure."

Cassidy turned to the crowd, her face a picture of feigned distress. "Oh dear," she sighed, "I don't know how those images got up there! My apologies, everyone. It seems someone has hacked into my private cloud account. I only keep these for... documentation, for Brynn's own good, of course." She shot me a look that promised utter destruction.

My heart hammered in my chest, a drumbeat of fury. She had used technology, his family's domain, to humiliate me, to cement my image as the crazy ex. The rage was a bitter taste in my mouth, but I held it back. Not yet. Not here.

"Brynn, you really must get help," Dayton said, his voice laced with patronizing concern. He made a show of comforting Cassidy, stroking her arm reassuringly. "This behavior is unacceptable."

That was it. The public humiliation, the lies, the sheer audacity of their cruelty. Something inside me snapped. I rose, slowly, deliberately, my eyes fixed on Cassidy. "You call this documentation, Cassidy?" I asked, my voice dangerously calm. "Or do you call it the desperate act of a woman terrified of losing her borrowed life?"

Dayton's eyes narrowed. "What are you talking about, Brynn? You need to calm down."

"Calm down?" I laughed, a harsh, brittle sound. "You want me to calm down after you've paraded my pain for your amusement? After you've allowed this viper to murder my dog and lie about my baby?" My voice rose, cutting through the hushed whispers of the guests. "You think you can play these games, Dayton? You think I'm still the naive girl you manipulated?"

He strode towards me, his face thunderous. "Silence, Brynn! You're making a scene!" He grabbed my arm, his grip tightening.

"Let go of me!" I screamed, wrenching my arm free. I met his furious gaze, unflinching. "You want a scene, Dayton Reed? You're about to get one."

He slapped me, hard, his palm connecting with my already bruised cheek. The force sent me reeling, but I didn't fall. My eyes met his, blazing with a fury that mirrored his own. "Take her to the underground bunker," he snarled, his voice a low growl. "And keep her there. I'm done with her charade."

Two guards immediately seized me, dragging me towards a hidden door. As I was pulled away, I met Cassidy's triumphant gaze. Her smile was a direct challenge. You lose.

"You think this is over?" I yelled, my voice echoing through the opulent hall. "This is just the beginning!"

I was thrown into a cold, damp underground cellar, the air thick with the smell of mildew and despair. The heavy steel door clanged shut, plunging me into suffocating darkness. I sank to the floor, my body aching, my spirit burning. He locked me up. Again. The irony was a bitter laugh in my throat. I had believed in a lie, and now I was paying the price.

Days blurred into an eternity in that dark cell. Food was shoved through a small slot, water rations were meager. I used the time to plan, to sharpen my resolve. They thought they had broken me. They were wrong. They had forged me.

Then, one morning, the cold steel door creaked open. A kindly old housekeeper, Mrs. Gable, peered in, her eyes filled with sympathy. "Ms. Miles," she whispered, "his mother, Henrietta, she arranged for your release. She didn't approve of this... confinement."

A flicker of surprise, a tiny crack in the icy wall around my heart. Henrietta. The woman who despised me. A strange, unexpected moment of grace from the most unlikely source. But it didn't change anything. Dayton had allowed my suffering. He had inflicted it himself.

As I made my way out, my body stiff and sore, I saw Dayton walking with Cassidy, her hand looped possessively through his arm. He laughed at something she said, a light, carefree sound that twisted my gut. He looked utterly content, completely oblivious to the pain he had caused, to the woman he had broken and rebuilt into a weapon. The man I loved was truly gone, replaced by a stranger, a monster. And this monster was perfectly happy.

I arrived back at my small apartment, the only solace I had left. But even that was tainted. My phone buzzed with notifications. Gossip sites, news reports, social media threads-all ablaze with the "Brynn Miles meltdown." My career, my reputation, everything I had worked for was in ruins. She had done a thorough job.

The phone rang. It was my boss, his voice tight with regret. "Brynn, I'm so sorry. The board... they've decided to let you go. The bad publicity is just too much."

I hung up, the receiver heavy in my hand. Everything. I had lost everything. But with nothing left to lose, came a terrifying freedom. A cold, hard resolve set in. I would not just leave. I would make them pay.

I stared at the Reed Tech logo on a news article, a bitter smile twisting my lips. I remembered him saying he resented being tied to my family due to my parents' death in his family's plant. The truth, finally, was out. And it was a weapon.

I found Cassidy at a charity gala, her face beaming under the flashing cameras. She was surrounded by her socialite friends, basking in the glow of her fabricated happiness. I walked straight up to her, my face devoid of emotion. "Cassidy," I said, my voice low, cutting through the din.

Her smile faltered. "Oh, Brynn," she said, feigning surprise. "Still lurking? Didn't you get the memo? You're no longer welcome here."

"The memo?" I asked, my voice dangerously soft. "The one where you pretend to be a victim, while orchestrating my destruction? The one where you use my parents' tragedy against me?" My eyes bored into hers.

Her eyes narrowed. "What are you talking about?"

"My parents died in a Reed plant," I stated, the words a cold, hard fact. "I heard Dayton tell his father about his 'atonement.' And you, Cassidy, you used that. You used my grief, my past, to drive a wedge between us."

Cassidy's face contorted into a sneer. "And so what if he did? They were liabilities, Brynn. Always were. Your pathetic, working-class parents were just a burden on the Reed family name."

That was it. The final straw. My parents. My dead parents. She had crossed a line. A red haze descended. I didn't think, I just acted. My hand shot out, not in a slap, but a punch, connecting squarely with her perfect jaw. She reeled back, a look of pure shock on her face. Her friends gasped.

"You will never speak about my parents again," I snarled, my voice low and menacing. "Do you understand me?"

Her shock quickly turned to fury. "You bitch!" she shrieked, lunging at me, nails extended. She scratched my face, drawing blood.

We grappled, a chaotic mess of flying limbs and tangled hair. This wasn't a fight; it was an eruption of five years of suppressed rage, grief, and betrayal. This was for Shadow. This was for my baby. This was for everything.

Suddenly, she let out a piercing scream, her hands flying to her stomach. She stumbled back, her eyes wide with a theatrical terror. She fell, dramatically, down the marble staircase, her body tumbling in a sickening heap. A collective gasp rose from the horrified guests.

I stood there, panting, a thin trickle of blood running down my cheek, my fists clenched. I knew what she was doing. I had seen her perform before. She was framing me. Again.

Chapter 4

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