The penthouse was quiet, but the kind of quiet that feels heavy, almost alive. It wasn’t the soothing silence of late-night calm; it was a fragile, tense stillness that carried the weight of every unspoken thought, every lingering fear.

Amelia stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows, arms loosely crossed, eyes tracing the city below. The streets sparkled like a thousand tiny stars, each light a life moving forward, oblivious to the storm that had nearly destroyed hers. She had always found ...