Chapter 16: The Cracks Beneath the Spotlight
The first thing I learned about being watched was this:
the danger wasn't the noise.
It was the waiting.
Days passed without explosions, without scandals, without dramatic confrontations. Just silence stretched thin, like glass about to fracture. Lucien went to meetings behind closed doors. Calls stopped abruptly when I entered rooms. Smiles were offered too quickly, reassurance too carefully.
I hated that kind of quiet.
It made me feel like the ground beneath my feet was shifting without warning.
By the third day, I stopped asking where Lucien was going. Not because I didn't care, but because I was afraid of the answers.
Instead, I tried to reclaim pieces of myself.
I read. I studied. I worked with the tutors sent to "protect my future," though every lesson felt like a distraction from the war being planned somewhere else. At night, I wrote in a notebook I kept hidden under my mattress—thoughts I couldn't say out loud, fears I didn't want anyone managing for me.
I wrote his name more times than I cared to admit.
Lucien came home late that evening, the weight on his shoulders heavier than before. He loosened his tie slowly, movements controlled, like if he rushed, something inside him might snap.
"You look exhausted," I said.
"I am," he replied. "But not surprised."
I waited.
"They're restructuring," he continued. "Board influence. Financial leverage. Public pressure disguised as responsibility."
"They're punishing you," I said.
He met my eyes. "They're testing me."
"And if you fail?"
His jaw tightened. "Then they prove their point."
I stepped closer. "Which is?"
"That love is a weakness."
The words landed hard.
"I don't want to be your weakness," I said quietly.
Lucien reached for my hands. "You're not. You're my reason."
The sincerity in his voice scared me more than any threat his family could make.
That night, I dreamed of drowning.
Not violently. Slowly. Water filling my lungs while people stood at the edge, debating whether I deserved to be saved.
I woke up gasping.
The next morning brought the crack.
A leaked document.
It appeared online without warning, shared across platforms within minutes. A legal agreement—old, but real—suggesting exit clauses in our marriage, numbers attached to my name like a price tag.
I stared at the screen, nausea rising.
"They're saying you're insured," I whispered. "Like I'm… replaceable."
Lucien looked furious. "This was never meant to be public."
"But now it is," I said. "And they'll use it."
They did.
Commentators debated my worth. Analysts argued whether I was a liability or an asset. Strangers dissected my expressions from the interview, searching for greed, desperation, calculation.
I felt stripped bare.
"They want me to break," I said softly.
Lucien nodded once. "Yes."
"Then why do I feel like I'm the one being tested?"
He didn't answer immediately.
"Because power always aims at the quieter target," he said at last. "They think you'll fold."
I straightened. "They don't know me."
A pause.
A small smile touched his lips. "No," he agreed. "They don't."
That afternoon, I made a decision without asking permission.
I posted a message.
No lawyers. No advisors. Just me.
I didn't deny the contract. I didn't justify it either. I spoke about choice. About growth. About refusing to let a past agreement define a present heart.
The response was immediate. Explosive.
Lucien found me standing by the window, phone still in my hand.
"You did that yourself," he said.
"Yes."
He searched my face. "Are you ready for what comes next?"
I thought about the girl I had been before all of this. Quieter. Smaller. Afraid of being too much.
"I think," I said slowly, "that whatever comes next was coming anyway."
Lucien nodded.
That night, for the first time since the world turned its eyes on us, we didn't talk about strategy or consequences.
We just sat together, shoulder to shoulder, watching the city breathe.
I knew the cracks were spreading beneath the spotlight.
I knew the fall might be brutal.
But I also knew this—
Once something breaks open, it never fits neatly back into the shape others demand.
And neither would I.