The penthouse of the Sterling Building didn't feel like a home anymore. It felt like a tomb—a mausoleum of glass and steel, suffused with cold, sterile air. Every polished surface gleamed with a kind of indifferent perfection, but it all felt hollow. Once, this space had been a symbol of power, wealth, and precision. Now it was a cage.
Reid stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows, staring out at the Manhattan skyline, where the city's chaos looked almost serene from thirty floors above. He hadn't slept in forty-eight hours. His tuxedo jacket had been discarded somewhere in the room; his white shirt was wrinkled, the collar undone, his tie loosened and forgotten on the marble floor.
Every time he closed his eyes, he saw that laptop in Casablanca. The way Maya had mocked his "cheap" ring for Julianne. The faint curl of her lips, the sharp glint in her silver eyes.
It was a taunt. A challenge. And it was becoming something darker—a dangerous, addictive obsession.
