Page 58 of Mane Rival in Store by Milly Taiden

Sybil: Good morning, sunshine! Oliver says hi. We’re trying that new brunch place in Tribeca, the one with the soufflé pancakes. Want to meet us at 12?

Lark stared at the message. Tried to compose a response that didn’t read like a distress signal.

Lark: Rain check. Busy morning.

Oliver: Define busy. Is it actually busy or is it lion-man busy? Because you’ve been suspiciously unavailable on weekday mornings and Dad noticed you humming at breakfast last week and I have QUESTIONS.

Lark: Actually busy. Work stuff.

Sybil: Let us know if you need anything.

Sybil could read the spaces between texts the way she read rooms—with quiet, devastating accuracy. The heart emoji was a bookmark: I see you, I’m here, I’ll ask real questions later. Oliver’s enthusiasm was a comfort and a complication. Her little brother had been on high alert since the day Fallon’s name had crossed a news ticker at the family dinner.

She put the phone down. Went back to work. Took the ten thirty meeting with the Tokyo supplier and discussed shipping logistics and answered Breezy’s follow-up emails and did not look at the service door and did not text Rune and did not return his call, which she let ring to voicemail while sitting three feet from her phone with her hands in her lap and her lipstick cracking from how hard she pressed her mouth shut.

Breezy appeared in the doorway at noon. Leaned against the frame. Studied Lark with the unhurried focus of a field commander assessing casualties.

“Rune called. You didn’t answer.”

“I saw.”

Breezy came inside. Shut the office door behind her. Pulled the guest chair around so they were face to face, knees almost touching. Her voice dropped. “Talk to me.”

Lark opened the drawer. Handed Breezy the letter.

Breezy read it. Her expression didn’t change—Breezy’s expressions operated on a classification system that required security clearance to interpret—but her thumb pressed into the margin hard enough to crease the paper.

“A.C. Holdings.”

“Creed Capital.”

“You verified?”

“Three clicks.”

Breezy set the letter on the desk. Straightened it with one finger. Aligning the edges the way she aligned everything—schedules, crises, the wreckage that powerful men left behind when they decided their egos outweighed other people’s livelihoods.

“He bought the building.”

“Through a shell. He tripled the rent. We have ninety days.”

Breezy’s jaw worked once—a rare tell, the equivalent of another person flipping a table. Then: “I’m calling the lawyers.”

“Call the lawyers.”

“And I’m pulling the A.C. Holdings filing for the full board structure. And I’m requesting a copy of the acquisition deed from the city. And I’m scheduling a meeting with your father’s firm because if Creed Capital acquired this property while we have an active lease with standard protections, there are approximately six legal avenues to challenge the renegotiation and I intend to use all of them.”

This was Breezy. The world collapsed and Breezy was building the scaffolding before the dust settled.

Breezy pulled out her phone. Typed. “We need a dedicated category for this. Subcategory: romantically motivated real estate aggression.”

Despite everything—the triple rent and the cold spreading through her veins and the closed door between her and the man she couldn’t bring herself to call—Lark’s mouth twitched.

“One more thing.” Breezy paused on her way out. “Are you going to tell Rune?”

The name landed like a struck match.

“Not yet.”