|Gryphon's POV|
The morning light spills across the Vérité soundstage like liquid gold, slanting through the high glass windows and setting the carefully designed set aglow, casting long, seductive shadows across the sprawling white bed and the sleek minimalism of the room that was built to look like a dream — or more precisely, a dangerous fantasy, one where reason is left trembling at the door.
I am already here before the first call echoes across the cavernous space, my body loose but my nerves strung tight as wire, pretending to be nonchalant as I lean against the scaffold rigging, pretending not to scan every entrance, every corridor, waiting for her.
And when Serena finally enters — wearing nothing but a slip of a dress so delicate and sheer it borders on the obscene — the air see
