The rain hadn’t stopped since morning. Not a drizzle, not a break, just a constant downpour like the sky was grieving with her. Milan was soaked in grey and grief, the kind that crawled under your skin and stayed there, the kind that made the air feel heavy like a sin you couldn’t shake. Rose stood at the floor-to-ceiling window in her suite, arms folded across her chest, a glass of red wine in her hand—untouched. She just held it like a prop. Something to do with her fingers while her mind spun.
Her reflection in the glass stared back at her—a ghost with red lipstick, wearing a silk robe that slid off one shoulder like it was exhausted too. The woman in the mirror looked too calm, too poised, but inside… chaos. A war she’d been losing quietly.
Behind her, silence. Just the soft hum of t
