Grief did not arrive in Lola gently.
It did not sit beside her or whisper condolences. It slammed into her like a locked door, sudden and final, leaving her gasping in a place where air already felt rationed.
Her father was dead.
Not sick.
Not fading.
Not waiting.
Dead.
And she had watched it happen through a screen.
The underground mansion did not pause for mourning. Lights stayed on. Cameras blinked. Guards walked their routes with the same mechanical precision. Somewhere above them, preparations were being made—black suits, folded programs, shallow condolences spoken over polished caskets.
Lola was not allowed to be part of that world.
She sat on the cold floor of her chamber, her back against the wall, knees drawn to her chest. Her throat burned from screaming. Her eyes were swollen, dry now, emptied of tears.
She had lost the right to cry the moment they killed him.
What remained was rage.
Controlled. Focused. Alive.
When the guards came for her, she did not resist. She stood, chin lifted, spine straight. Grief had not broken her. If anything, it had carved her into something sharper.
They brought her before the panel.
Not Leo. Not yet.
Men in tailored suits sat behind a glass table, their faces polite, distant, carefully neutral. The kind of men who approved deaths with signatures and slept peacefully afterward.
She didn't wait for them to speak.
"I want to attend my father's funeral," Lola said.
The words were steady. That alone unsettled them.
One of the men cleared his throat. "That isn't possible under current conditions."
"My father was murdered," she replied. "By your company. You will at least grant me the decency of burying him."
Another man slid a document across the table.
The agreement.
The same inked coffin they had offered from the beginning.
"You may attend," he said smoothly. "After you sign."
Lola stared at the paper.
Then she laughed.
It started softly, then grew—sharp, humorless, echoing against the glass walls. The men shifted uncomfortably.
"You killed him," she said. "And now you want my silence as a souvenir?"
"This is not personal," one of them said.
She slammed her palms on the table.
"Everything about this is personal."
Silence stretched.
"If you sign," the man continued, "you walk free. You mourn. You live."
"And if I don't?"
"Then you stay," he said. "And the funeral happens without you."
The cruelty of it was surgical.
Lola leaned back in her chair, eyes dark, voice calm in a way that should have frightened them more than shouting.
"You think this is leverage," she said. "It's not. It's proof."
"Proof of what?"
"That Aurelian Harmony Group is built on fear," Lola replied. "And men like you mistake compliance for respect."
She pushed the agreement back toward them.
"I won't sign."
That was when things changed.
They locked her chamber door for three days.
No visits. No meals beyond the bare minimum. No conversation. Silence as punishment.
On the fourth day, Lola began to speak—to the walls, to the cameras, to anyone listening.
She spoke about her father. About loyalty. About injustice. About how men who hid behind systems were cowards pretending to be gods.
She laughed. She mocked. She narrated their crimes like a bedtime story meant to keep monsters awake at night.
Her voice carried.
And it reached Leo.
The day he came down himself, the air shifted.
The guards stood straighter. The cameras refocused. The underground mansion seemed to hold its breath as he descended into the chamber where Lola was kept.
She was sitting on the edge of her bed when the door opened.
She did not stand.
Leo entered slowly, his presence filling the space without effort. His suit was immaculate, his expression calm—but there was tension beneath it now, something coiled and sharp.
"You've been loud," he said.
"Grief makes people honest," Lola replied. "You should try it."
His jaw tightened.
"You were offered mercy," Leo said. "You refused."
"You offered a leash," she shot back. "I don't kneel."
"You will," Leo said quietly. "Everyone does."
Lola stood then, closing the distance between them until only a breath separated their faces.
"No," she said. "Everyone you respect does."
The insult landed clean.
"You want to attend the funeral," Leo said. "Sign."
"You want my silence," Lola replied. "Choke on it."
The room went cold.
"You are in no position to bargain," Leo warned.
She tilted her head, eyes glittering. "Funny. You're the one who came down here."
That was a mistake.
Leo's control fractured—not fully, but enough.
"Watch your tongue," he said, voice low, dangerous. "You're alive because I allow it."
Lola smiled.
"Oh, please," she said. "You don't scare me."
His eyes darkened.
"I should," he said.
She laughed again, sharper this time.
"You don't," she said. "You're surrounded by men who worship you, obey you, fall at your feet. And you still had to come down here yourself."
She gestured around the chamber.
"Why?" she asked. "Because I'm a woman? Because I won't submit? Or because men are easy for you, Leo—but I'm not?"
The silence that followed was explosive.
She leaned closer.
"What's wrong?" she whispered. "Afraid I see through you? Afraid I don't want you, don't fear you, don't bend?"
Her voice dropped, venom-sweet.
"Or are you just scared of women who don't fall for you the way men do?"
That did it.
Leo's hand slammed against the wall beside her head, cracking stone.
"Say another word," he hissed, "and you will regret it for the rest of your life."
She did not flinch.
Instead, she smiled wider.
"Gay," she said lightly. "And fragile."
The fury on his face was no longer contained.
"You are nothing," Leo snapped. "A mouth without power. A body without protection."
"And yet," Lola replied calmly, "here you are."
For a moment, she thought he might kill her himself.
Instead, he straightened, smoothing his jacket with deliberate care.
"You will not attend the funeral," he said coldly. "You will not sign. And you will learn what happens to people who confuse courage with stupidity."
He turned to leave.
At the door, he paused.
"Watch your tongue," Leo said over his shoulder. "Or I will remove it."
The door slammed shut.
Lola exhaled slowly, her hands shaking—not from fear, but from adrenaline.
She sank back onto the bed, staring at the wall where his hand had struck.
He had promised to deal with her.
Good.
Because somewhere deep inside her grief, beneath the anger and the loss, something else had been born.
Not despair.
Not surrender.
War.