Adrian stepped out of the anteroom because the wedding demanded his attention at precisely the wrong second.
A coordinator intercepted him with a clipboard and a voice trained to sound urgent without ever rising, presenting a problem so minor it barely registered as one. A seating adjustment. A timing clarification. A confirmation of something he had already approved twice. The interruption irritated him not because it delayed him, but because it presumed his attention could be borrowed without consequence.
He answered calmly, because calm was his default and because calm was what he used to keep the world from seeing what sharpened beneath it.
Calm was what he had built his life on. Calm was what had carried him through negotiations designed to exhaust and break weaker men. Calm was wh
