The last model left the runway, and the hall went quiet for one beat. Then the audience stood.
They were calling my name.
Arthur squeezed my hand. “Go take your bow.”
I stepped from the wings in a midnight silk jumpsuit of my own design. I had named it *The Rebuttal*.
The spotlights were hot, and the applause came from buyers and critics whose reviews I had followed for years.
Julian sat in the front row.
His usual smirk had vanished. He stared at me, then at Arthur beside the stage, and gripped the arms of his chair.
He did not clap.
Backstage, champagne corks popped while models changed and assistants packed the finished pieces in tissue and garment bags. Critics whose names I knew from magazines waited to shake my hand.
After four years in the shadow, every question about the c
