“Exactly,” I said. “This isn’t him losing faith in her. This is punishment. Control. A reminder that everything she has goes through him first.”
Maven exhaled slowly, fury simmering just beneath the surface. “So what now, Coach?”
I watched Nathan lean in toward Ariana, murmuring something in her ear that made her smile tighten another fraction.
My heart drummed inside me, unsteady and hurried. This felt like a moment that changed everything — the point of no return.
It felt like I was ready to risk it all.
“Now,” I said, voice low and steady, “we stop letting him control the story. And we make damn sure Ariana knows she’s not crazy — and she’s not alone.”
Trojan Horse
Ariana
Present
Nathan’s voice washed over the crowd like white noise.
I knew, distantly, what he was saying — something about donor generosity, something about community impact, something about howwe couldn’t do this without you.
But it was all muted.
I stood at his side, my hand resting lightly on his arm, smiling when I was supposed to, nodding along as if I weren’t hearing the same speech he’d been giving in slightly different variations for years. I chimed in at the right moments — thanking benefactors by name, laughing softly at the right jokes, letting my gaze linger on familiar faces just long enough to seem engaged.
I played my part perfectly.
Inside, I felt hollow.
The ballroom glittered around us — crystal chandeliers, polished marble floors, gowns and tuxedos and champagne flutes catching the light — but all I wanted was for it to end. I longed for the night to be over, for the weight in my chest to loosen just enough that I could breathe again.
I wanted to go home.
My stomach twisted when I realized I never could again.
Home didn’t exist anymore. It was just a house that didn’t feel like mine, walls that closed in instead of sheltering, silence that felt loud with things I wasn’t allowed to say. There was no room in it for me unless I stayed small, pleasant, and useful.
I swallowed hard, my smile never faltering even as I felt my soul dying within me.
Nathan kept on as I took a half a step to stand behind him. I stayed close enough to look united, but inched far enough away that no one would notice how rigid I felt, how carefully I held myself together. My feet ached in my heels. The sheer train of my dress brushed against my calves when I shifted my weight, and I found myself wishing it were a real cape, that I was a superhero somehow, that I could morph into someone else in that very moment.
If I could’ve slipped out of my own skin, I would have.
Applause rippled through the room, and I clapped along with it, my palms meeting softly and mechanically. Nathan leaned toward me, murmuring, “Good job, sweetheart,”as his hand settled at my lower back in a gesture that looked affectionate and felt like a reminder.
I was aware of him constantly: where he stood, who he was watching, how close he kept me.
As soon as we were off stage, we were surrounded. People flooded to Nathan’s side like they had since the day I met him. He was magnetic like that, everyone drawn to his charm the same way I’d been.
I felt like a sucker now, and I couldn’t help but think they were all suckers, too.
My cheeks hurt from the smile I forced as each person who surrounded us praised Nathan, shaking his hand like he was the goddamn president. I was an afterthought, of course, but I still smiled when they acknowledged me.
“Ariana,” a bright voice cut in.
I blinked out of my haze, ears clearing like I’d just emerged from being underwater.
Grace appeared at Nathan’s side with Maven just behind her, both of them beaming like this was the most natural interruption in the world even as the group of highly prestigious benefactors eyed them curiously, like they weren’t sure what to make of them until they figured out how much money they had.
