Gabrielle Serenity had been raised inside quiet glass corridors and private jets, taught early that money insulated everything except obligation. Serenity Resorts carried her last name across coastlines, and with it came expectations she never bothered to soften. At eighteen, she moved through rooms with a cold precision that kept people distant, her long black hair always blown smooth, her grey eyes heavy-lashed and empty of warmth. People called her cruel, unapproachable, mean. She never corrected them. A week earlier, her grandmother had summoned her into a sitting room that smelled of polish and age and informed her, without hesitation, that the future had already been decided. Marriage. Papers. Control. The man was older, deeply rooted in a world that thrived on unpaid debts and broken bodies. Refusal was never mentioned. Silence was taken as consent. The table was solid oak, scarred with old cuts and cigarette burns that hadn’t been sanded out. The documents were aligned perfectly, corners squared, pens laid out like instruments. There were no flowers, no witnesses meant to celebrate. Just function. Harvey sat across from her, already signing, his movements unhurried. His shirt was unbuttoned enough to show muscle pulled tight over old damage, pale scars crossing his abdomen in crooked lines, one thin blade mark tugging the skin beside his mouth downward. He didn’t look at her while he signed. He didn’t need to. The priest stood at her side, finger landing on the page again and again, telling her where to sign, telling her it was simple, telling her it would be quick. Her hand hovered above the paper, shaking so hard the pen rattled softly against the wood. The line with her name waited, stark and unforgiving. Her breathing had gone shallow, chest barely moving, eyes locked on the ink as if staring long enough might erase it. One friend leaned close on her left, murmuring that it was just paper, that she could get through this minute, that fighting now would only make it worse. The other stood behind her, palm pressed firmly between her shoulders, trying to ground her, trying to stop the visible tremor running through her arms. The priest cleared his throat, irritation creeping into his voice as he repeated himself. Sign here. Now. Harvey stopped writing. The room shifted with that small movement. He leaned back in his chair, then forward, close enough that she could smell metal and smoke on his breath. His mouth hovered by her ear, voice low and precise. "You’re shaking like you still think this is a choice," he said quietly. "It isn’t. You can either sign that line cleanly, right now, or I can remind you how many people around you still belong to me by extension." He paused, letting the silence stretch. "I’d hate to start with friends. They always break faster than family." His breath brushed her skin as he continued, unhurried. "If you make me look stupid in front of a priest over a pen stroke, I’ll make sure every person who ever smiled at you regrets it. Slowly. Very slowly. And you’ll sit next to me while it happens." The priest looked away. Her friends stiffened, hands tightening but not moving. The shaking in her hand grew worse, fingers numb, grip slipping as the pen dragged a thin, broken line across the page. Ink smeared where her control failed, bleeding into the paper fibers. She forced the pen down again, jaw clenched so tight it ached, wrist trembling violently as she scratched her name into place, uneven and jagged, nothing like the signature she’d practiced her entire life. When the last letter was finished, the room stayed silent. Harvey leaned back into his chair, picked up his pen again, and resumed signing as if nothing had happened.