Chapter 363
“This is my original vision!” Belle stammered, her face flushing a guilty, blotchy red. “You have nothing to do with this!”
Isolde let out a soft, mocking chuckle. “Original? It’s a bold design. Very ambitious.” She tilted her head. “I truly hope you’ve accounted for all the unforeseen variables.”
Belle blinked. The panic in her eyes spiked. “What variables?”
Isolde leaned in close enough to smell Belle’s expensive perfume mixing with the sour edge of fear sweat. “Gravity is a harsh critic,” she whispered. “And physics doesn’t care how much money you throw at it.”
Grayson stepped between them, his brow set hard. “Isolde, stop it. Don’t try to frighten her with your technical jargon.”
Isolde shifted her gaze to him. Her eyes were flat and dead, stripped of any warmth or history. “I am not frightening her, Grayson,” she said calmly. “I am warning you. You backed the wrong horse. And you stole from the wrong woman.”
Grayson’s jaw clenched. He leaned down until his face was inches from hers. “I didn’t steal anything,” he hissed, his breath hot against her skin. “We were married, Isolde. Under New York law, what was yours was mine.”
The sheer entitlement of it turned her stomach.
“Not anymore,” Isolde said, her voice dropping to a lethal whisper. “My brain is not community property. You took the blueprints, but you left the genius behind.”
She turned on her heel and walked away.
Bе 𝗽𝖺r𝗍 𝗈𝖿 𝗼𝘂𝘳 cо𝗆𝘮𝘶n𝗂t𝘺 𝗈𝘯 𝗀𝗮𝗅ոo𝘃e𝗹𝘴.𝖼o𝗺
The fear in Belle’s eyes mutated instantly into desperate, defensive anger.
“You’re just jealous!” Belle shouted, her voice ricocheting off the marble walls and drawing stares from the contractors in line. “We are having our grand opening gala this Friday — at the Met! Everyone who matters will be there to see my genius!”
Isolde stopped.
She turned her head slowly and looked back over her shoulder. A cold, predatory smile touched the corners of her lips.
“Friday?” she said. “Good. I love a show.”
She walked out through the brass doors, leaving the two of them standing in the cold, echoing hall.
Behind her, Belle grabbed Grayson’s arm, her fingers digging into his suit jacket.
“Gray,” Belle whispered, her voice wavering with sudden doubt. “What did she mean? There are no variables, right? You had your engineers check everything?”
Grayson stared at the doors Isolde had just walked through.
He didn’t answer.
Friday morning at Carson Dynamics Headquarters felt electric.
Isolde was at her desk reviewing the final code for the drone stabilizer when a courier knocked on the glass door. He handed her a thick, heavy envelope made of expensive cream cardstock, sealed with gold wax.
She broke the seal.
It was an invitation to the InnoTech Inaugural Gala. The venue: the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The recipient line read: Isolde Carson, plus guest.
Arland walked in just as she set the card on her desk. He read the gold embossed letters and scoffed. “They actually invited you? That is pure masochism.”
.