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I straighten my spine, meeting his gaze. "The merger's a bandaid on a bullet wound. My renewable energy proposal alone would triple our market cap in five years. But you'd rather sell us off than admit your son might actually know something about the future."

Father's laugh is sharp and dismissive. "Those pet projects of yours? Unproven, untested fantasies. This is business, not one of your idealistic daydreams."

"You've never even looked at the projections," I counter, my voice steady despite the rage building in my chest. "The market research, the potential partnerships—all of it sitting on your desk for months. Years. You talk about survival, but you refuse to evolve."

"I built this company from the ground up," he snarls, jabbing a finger into my chest. "I know what works. I know what's necessary."

"The merger is about control, not progress," I say. "The Westwoods want the same thing you do—power concentrated in fewer hands. That's not change—it's consolidation. It's fear disguised as strategy."

"Ares, please..." Mother moves closer, her voice honey-sweet with practiced concern.

She reaches up to brush imaginary lint from my shoulder, her touch light but possessive.

"You're our only son. Everything we've sacrificed has been for your future.

This merger secures your destiny, your chance to lead this company to greatness.

" Her eyes shimmer with calculated tears, one perfectly timed drop sliding down her cheek.

"Would you destroy your children's legacy before they're even born? "

Their expectations crush down—decades of grooming, of calculated preparation. For a heartbeat, I feel it all: duty, guilt, the terror of disappointing them. Then I remember the price I've already paid—endless empty smiles, hollow promises, the suffocating weight of living someone else's life.

"I won't do it." My voice holds steady against the hurricane inside. "I won't be your pawn, not even for Saint Industries."

Father's face turns to stone as he invades my space. His cologne—sandalwood and power—surrounds me like a threat.

"This isn't a fairy tale where you follow your heart, Ares. This is business." He spits the word like venom. "And I won't let you destroy it."

"How will you stop me?" I nod toward the crowd of socialites and reporters devouring every word, their phones raised like weapons. "Planning to drag me back by force? That should make an interesting headline."

His nostrils flare. We both know I've won. Any show of force now would destroy them in the press.

I find Ethan by the exit, coiled and ready. His hazel eyes are alert, scanning for threats even as his lips quirk up in that familiar half-smile that's gotten us through a dozen tight spots before. He straightens his tie—a deliberate signal that our escape route is clear.

"Ares!" Cameras flash like lightning as I shoulder past Father, capturing every moment of my rebellion. Each photo hammers another nail in my gilded cage.

The crowd parts, their scandalized whispers following me like a trail of breadcrumbs:

"Can't believe he'd dare—"

"The Saint legacy—"

"What a disgrace—"

Their judgment should crush me, but each step toward freedom feels lighter, like shedding chains I've worn so long they became part of my skin.

"Mr. Saint! One comment—"

"The engagement—"

"About the merger—"

I push past them, locked on Ethan's anchoring presence. Everything's falling into place—the media circus, the public scene, our calculated escape. No chance for my parents to bury this scandal.

"Ready to blow this popsicle stand?" Ethan's casual words can't hide the steel in his shoulders or the alert watchfulness in his eyes. He scans the room one last time, his stance reminding me of our boarding school days—the same posture he took before we scaled the wall for midnight adventures.

"Get me out of here."

He moves instantly, reading the urgency in my voice. Mother's panic-shrill calls chase us down the marble hallway, each echo an accusation. The click of her heels against stone grows faster, more desperate.

"Car's waiting," Ethan says as we walk through the long hall, nodding to a server who deliberately looks away. "Jet's ready. Boston by morning."

Boston.

The word sucker-punches me, unleashing memories I've fought to bury. Summer afternoons sitting on the garden bench. Stolen kisses behind the rose bushes. Promises whispered against warm skin. I haven't been back since... since her. Since everything shattered.

I clench my jaw, forcing the memories back down. That's the past, and it needs to stay there. Buried where it belongs.

The moment we step outside the night air slaps my face, the sudden chill raising goosebumps on my skin.

Los Angeles glitters below, an endless ocean of lights stretching to the horizon.

How many nights did I stand at my office window, staring at this view, playing their perfect heir?

How many years wasted pretending to be someone I'm not?

"Incoming," Ethan warns as Jessica's voice slices through the darkness.

"You're making a mistake." She looms at the top of the stairs, venue lights casting her in a dramatic silhouette. Her dress shimmers like liquid gold, her hands balled into fists at her sides. "Come back inside. We can fix this. Your parents are willing to overlook this... episode."

I face her one final time, taking in the perfect arrangement of features that never stirred anything in me beyond mild appreciation. "No."

The car door opens with a soft click. I slide in without a backward glance.

In the rearview mirror, my parents stand frozen at the entrance—Mother's hand at her mouth, mascara smudged beneath one eye; Father's face thunderous with rage, one hand gripping the doorframe.

The perfect tableau of betrayed aristocracy.

Their figures grow smaller and smaller in the mirror until they're nothing but specks of light, then nothing at all—swallowed by the dark.

"You good?" Ethan asks as we merge onto the highway. City lights blur past like meteors, each one a star in my old universe growing more distant by the second.

A sensation I'd almost forgotten unfurls in my chest, tentative at first, then stronger. Recognition hits slowly, like dawn breaking after an endless night.

Freedom.

And with it, thunder.

Because I know my parents. This isn't the end—it's barely the beginning. They'll unleash everything they have. They'll try to drag me back to their gilded prison.

But for the first time, I'm ready.

My phone erupts with messages—the PR team's first desperate salvos, their panic evident in the frequency of notifications. I switch it off, the sudden silence almost deafening.

Twenty minutes later, the highway gives way to empty access roads. The private airport materializes ahead, runway lights piercing the darkness like salvation. Our jet waits, engines humming promises of escape.

"Last chance to bail," Ethan says as we pull up to the terminal, his expression serious despite the lightness in his tone. "Though that was one epic exit speech."

I climb out of the car, breathing in the cool night air. Taking a final look at Los Angeles—my glittering cage of dreams and lies—I pause at the foot of the boarding stairs. Somewhere in that sparkling wasteland, my parents are mobilizing, plotting to reclaim their wayward heir.

But they don't understand. Some chains, once shattered, can never be reforged.

Minutes later, I sink into the leather seat as the jet taxis, my racing pulse a war drum. Just adrenaline, I tell myself. Just the rush of torching my old life. Nothing more.

It has nothing to do with Boston. Nothing to do with her, or the memories that still haunt me.

Nothing at all.