BRIAN

The armored elevator doors slid open with a heavy, mechanical click, letting us directly into the penthouse foyer. The air in here was sterile, freezing, an environment I controlled entirely.

Daisy walked in ahead of me, her eyes glued to the dark wood floorboards. Her sneakers left faint, dry dust tracks from the harbor across my rugs. She looked completely broken, her shoulders curved inward, her arms crossed tightly over her ribs as if trying to hold the pieces of her shattered pride together manually.

I stepped into the foyer right behind her, the heavy steel security door sealing shut with a definitive thunk that resonated through the entire...