The Vale Academy, tucked behind tall hedges and iron gates, was a school that taught power before arithmetic.
Its students wore pressed uniforms and names like brands; Montclaire, Elwood, Sang-Rhee. Legacy families. Billionaire lineages. Arin Vale did not fit in.
Not really.
He was too quiet. Too observant.
And lately…too visible.
It started small. A whisper here. A shove in the hallway. Gum in his sketchbook. "You think you're special just because your mom's trending?"
But that day, it escalated.
One of the older boys cornered him behind the gym. Called Lianna a name. Called Arin a mistake. Said his father didn't want him either.
Arin didn't cry.
He simply punched the boy in the face.
The phone call came while Lianna was signing off on logistics for her new art fund. Calm voice. Polite tone. A principal trained to say "incident" instead of "assault."
Her hand froze over the paper.
"What do you mean he was alone?"
She arrived at the school within twenty minutes.
Her heels clicked like thunder through the lobby.
The boy Arin had hit had a bloody nose and a father already threatening lawsuits. Arin sat quietly in the nurse's office, his sketchbook clutched like a shield.
Lianna knelt in front of him.
"Did he hit you first?"
Arin shook his head.
"What did he say?"
Arin didn't answer.
But Lianna saw it anyway…the bruised pride, the steel behind his silence.
And she knew.
She didn't yell. She didn't cry.
She turned to the glass wall and made one phone call.
By the next morning, Arin had two private security guards in plain clothes stationed on campus.
One of them carried his backpack.
——
The clip played on a muted news segment about celebrity children. Not even a headline. Just B-roll.
A grainy zoom of Arin Vale stepping out of school with security in tow.
Kian stared at the footage on his phone.
No sound. Just image.
He clenched his jaw. His grip on the phone tightened until the glass threatened to crack.
He didn't say anything.
But his mind betrayed him.
Three years ago.
Arin had been sick….just a fever, but he'd cried until his voice gave out. Lianna had been in Paris for an exhibit. The nanny was off. The staff useless.
It was the first time Kian had been alone with him overnight.
He'd stood in the boy's doorway, unsure of what to do.
But then Arin reached out a small hand….feverish and shaking….and Kian didn't move away.
He stayed.
He sat beside the bed and let Arin curl against his shoulder like a child who trusted him.
That night, Arin had whispered something in sleep.
"Don't let anything take her away."
Kian had never asked what he meant.
And somehow… he'd forgotten that moment.
Until now.
Kian sat alone in his penthouse, high above the Mexico City skyline. The sky outside was turning to copper, and the lights below flickered like stars.
His phone buzzed.
1 New Message – Arin.
He hadn't heard from him in weeks. Not since the divorce went public.
He opened it.
I hope you're not still hurting her.
No emojis.
No punctuation.
Just quiet condemnation from a child too young to hate, but old enough to remember.
Kian stared at the screen.
And for the first time since the split….
he couldn't breathe.
•
The Museum of Modern Art in Mexico City shimmered underneath golden floodlights. The marble steps glowed like a stage carved for a legend.
Inside, the annual Winter Arts Gala had drawn the world's most powerful….fashion designers, tech billionaires, film directors, oil heirs, and old European bloodlines wrapped in couture. But tonight, all of them were background.
Tonight, she was the painting everyone came to see.
Lianna Vale didn't just arrive.
She entered.
Draped in a floor-length gown the color of obsidian silk, her neck bare, her shoulders soft and strong. The dress whispered wealth without apology, and her smile…small, unreadable…suggested a secret only she remembered.
The cameras didn't stop clicking.
She walked slowly. Gracefully. Not like someone proving anything.
Like someone who no longer had to.
Mila Ren hovered behind her, a champagne flute in hand, already orchestrating another whisper campaign in heels sharper than her words.
"She didn't come back," Mila murmured to a nearby journalist. "They tried to bury her."
She leaned in, smiling with teeth..
"But she was the seed."
⸻
Across the city, inside a high-rise penthouse that smelled of bourbon and cold marble, Kian Vale watched the gala footage in silence.
The massive screen in his office glowed with Lianna's image. That same face he used to wake up next to. Those same eyes that once looked for him in every room. Now they passed through flashbulbs and headlines like she had never belonged to anyone .
Gabriel Kentucky, his assistant, hovered with a tablet in hand, half-reading from a press brief.
"She's launching a luxury line. 'SEREIN'. Clothing, perfume, design collaborations. Early buzz says it's modern revenge wear for the quietly powerful. All based on—"
"I don't want to see all that," Kian said suddenly, his voice low, sharp.
Gabriel stopped. The screen went dark with a swipe. But it was too late.
Her image was already in his mind.
Her scent. Her laugh. The way she used to touch his jaw like he was breakable.
He exhaled through his nose, jaw tightening.
He looked nothing like the man who wanted to let her go.
He shoulder was broader now. Dark hair tousled, shirt sleeves rolled to the elbows, his custom suit unbuttoned at the collar. That alpha kind of elegance…effortless, lethal. He had the kind of hands you didn't say no to. The kind of gaze that could freeze a boardroom.
But tonight, none of it mattered.
Not when his heart…so carefully walled…betrayed him in a single breath.
He missed her.
He poured himself a drink. Neat. No ice. No dilution.
He blinked, once.
Her face lingered anyway.
He wanted her back. And for the first time, he wasn't sure if she would ever let him close enough to even touch the hem of her dress.
⸻
The next morning, the newspaper hit his door with a dull, indifferent thud.
He wasn't expecting to look. But habit, or maybe punishment, made him pick it up anyway before the staff would.
Front page.
"THE EX-WIFE WHO WON."
Above the fold: Lianna, backlit in diamonds and shadows of persons. Smiling, untouchable.
He stared.
And the headline didn't just sting.
It burned.