Fever Dreams and Fractured Trust
Rain battered the office windows, turning Manhattan into a smudged charcoal sketch. Isabella’s heels clicked too loudly in the hushed hallway—Ace’s absence had infected the building like a phantom limb. Three days. Three days of whispered rumors (“*He’s in rehab*”/“*Hostile takeover*”/“*Alien abduction, honestly plausible*”) and Melissa mainlining Red Bull to field panicked investor calls.
Isabella paused at Melissa’s desk, where Ace’s sister Lily sat cross-legged in a Nirvana tee riddled with safety pins, her Docs kicking the leg of Melissa’s chair. The two were snorting over a t****k of a raccoon wearing a tiny hat, pilfered from a toddler’s birthday party.
“—and then it yeets the cupcake into a sewer!” Lily wheezed, slapping the desk.
Melissa w
