(Ryder)
Over a week had dragged by, each day thick and sticky like tar. I left a trail across January's polished floors, pacing from window to wall to door and back again. Despite the mansion's vast rooms, the walls seemed to inch closer with every passing hour.
"It's been over a week, Harding. How long am I supposed to keep laying low?"
Her eyes didn't leave the laptop, fingers flying over the keyboard. "Until I say so, Ryder. The senator hasn't gotten back to me, and that's not good news."
I stopped dead, running a hand through my hair, tugging at the roots until it hurt. "But Mira, she looked for me at first, but now she's vanished. What if she's finally done? What if she's actually leaving me alone?"
January's head snapped up. Her stare cut like broken glass. "Really, Ryder? Do you actually believe the woman who stalked you for years, who made you her obsession, just decided to let go because she got bored? That's not how this ends."
The sting of her words burned, but beneath it was the truth I couldn't swallow. "No," I admitted. "Of course not. But maybe her dad... maybe he convinced her to back off."
"I doubt it." January's tone was flat, final. "And until I have proof otherwise, you're not leaving this house. I've already pulled the legal team in. We're bracing for whatever he throws at us, court filings, media stunts, backroom threats. If she resurfaces, you'll be covered on all sides."
January had already moved. Quietly, surgically, like an artist laying the first careful incision. Her call to the senator went unanswered, but the silence told her enough. She wasn't waiting for permission anymore. She suspected he wouldn't go along with what we needed, and time was already running short.
I knew she had laid down the framework of protection. A police report filed, incident number in hand, because a record on file could mean leverage later. Police involvement wasn't just a formality; it supported the petition for an emergency order, and it forced third parties to take preservation requests seriously.
"Ex parte gets you breathing room," she said, her tone calm but relentless. She explained it to me; it was a temporary restraining order drafted and submitted without Mira being notified, granted provisionally, buying time before the other side even knew it existed. On paper, I was already protected: Mira barred from contact, from circling near my home, my work, my gym. All of it done in silence. She wouldn't know until service was required.
Meanwhile, January's hands were everywhere, collecting what I already controlled. Screenshots of chats exported and time-stamped, cloud backups duplicated, voicemails saved, photographs of bruises catalogued alongside medical records, witness statements signed and sealed. Originals locked away, copies archived.
"Listen, Ryder," she said, "everything from here on is about control. We preserve everything. Not subpoenas yet—too loud, too fast. I'm drafting preservation letters. Phone carriers, social media platforms, email providers. They won't delete a thing if they get those notices. The data just sits there, frozen in place, waiting for us to claim it later. Mira won't know. She won't get the luxury of a warning shot."
I nodded, though my throat felt tight. "And the devices?" I asked.
She leaned forward, her gaze sharp. "The ones you legally have? Phones, laptops, drives—we're sending them out for forensic imaging. Bit-for-bit clones. We calculate hash values so if anyone dares say a file was tampered with, we have proof it wasn't. Every handoff logged. Chain of custody airtight. No judge, no jury, no journalist could argue it's been tainted."
I rubbed a hand over my face, trying to ground myself. "So she can't claim I faked anything."
"Exactly." Her tone didn't waver. "We'll keep the originals in an evidence locker, sealed, logged, untouchable. The forensic copies will go to my team and to independent labs. Metadata stays intact—timestamps, geolocation, server logs."
It was a fortress built in silence. Mira didn't know. The senator didn't know. Not yet. January had bought us time, and time was all we needed to move forward.
The days blurred. Spence stopped by, bringing takeout and his quiet brand of loyalty. Mel came with him once, trying to lighten the air with jokes that fell flat against the weight in the room.They sat with me, tried to remind me I wasn't alone. But the truth was, I was ever since I lost her.
Then one afternoon, we all met in January's office, the phone rang. A clipped voice asked her to turn on the Senator' s channel.
The moment the feed cut to the press room, my stomach dropped into freefall. Cameras clicked in violent bursts, flashbulbs exploding like miniature lightning storms as the senator approached the podium. Mira stood beside him, hands folded, eyes lowered, every detail curated. She had dressed herself in innocence—hair pulled back too tightly, drowning in an oversized beige cardigan, a tissue trembling in her grip. Fragile by design. Vulnerable by costume. Even now, I recognized the exact shade of lip gloss she wore only when she wanted pity, and the sight of it burned hotter than any wound she had left on me.
The senator gripped the lectern, his voice carrying the solemn weight of a man performing duty, not theater."No father should ever have to do this," he declared, grave and steady. "But today my daughter, Mira, has chosen to come forward about the abuse she suffered at the hands of Ryder Haas."
Abuse. The word detonated inside my skull, sharp and merciless. My chest seized around it. It didn't sound like an accusation, it sounded like a verdict.
Mira pressed the tissue to her cheek, eyes glistening, though no tear had dared to fall. When she finally lifted her gaze to the crowd, her voice cracked like porcelain. "I loved him," she whispered, a confession rehearsed to perfection. "God help me, I loved him and for months, I thought if I just stayed quiet, if I just tried harder, maybe the anger would stop. But it never did.He—he hurt me. He told me no one would believe me, because of who he is and I believed him."
Reporters leaned forward, pens scratching, cameras zooming. Every sob-laced syllable painted me as the monster in her story: the abuser, the predator, the man with too much strength and too little mercy. She spoke like survival itself was etched into her bones, while I was reduced to a caricature of violence, a cautionary tale with my name stamped on it.
It didn't matter that I had bruises in photographs, hospital reports, texts where she admitted rage. None of that was here. All they saw was Mira—the trembling daughter, the wronged woman, the victim who had found her courage, and in the eyes of the press, the public, and soon the courts, that was enough.
Her shoulders shook, dainty, rehearsed.
My hands balled into fists. I could still feel the sting of her nails down my arm, still see the blood on my shirt, and now she was flipping it, feeding the world a story where I was the monster.
January's voice cut low beside me. "She's reading from a script."
Mira sniffled theatrically, the sound slicing through the room like a rehearsed cue. "I stayed because I thought I could save him. I was wrong. I can't be silent anymore. No woman should."
