Chapter 99:


    The velvet was strained to the breaking point. The stitching was visible — white threads pulling against dark green fabric. The zipper was warped, creating a lumpy ridge along Belle’s side.


    “You’re a size twenty-six, Belle,” Isolde said, her voice clinical. “Perhaps a twenty-eight in Italian cuts. You’ve forced yourself into a container that was never built for you.”


    Belle’s face went scarlet. She moved her hand to cover the seam, but the motion only made the fabric groan audibly.


    “It’s just the angle,” Belle hissed.


    “It’s a metaphor,” Isolde said, meeting her eyes. “You’re wearing my clothes. You’re living in my house. You’re sleeping with my husband. But none of it fits, does it? You’re bursting at the seams, trying to be me.”


    The cameraman snickered.


    “Take it off,” Isolde said. “Before you ruin the silk. Although, knowing you, you’ve probably already sweated through the lining.”


    Belle let out a strangled cry of fury and turned toward the building entrance, one hand mped over her side. She looked ridiculous — hobbling in shoes she couldn’t walk in, in a dress that was slowly strangling her.


    Isolde watched her go.


    Join themunity at


    “Ms. Carson?”


    Isolde turned. It was ire, a senior engineer at Orbital who had been openly skeptical of Isolde’s hiring. She was carrying a thick stack of files.


    “Show’s over,” ire said, dropping the files onto a nearby table. “If you’re done ying fashion police, we have a problem. The orbital decay parameters for the satellite project are off. We need a recalction. By tonight.”


    Isolde looked at the stack. It was a week’s worth of mathematics.


    “Tonight?” Isolde asked.


    “Unless you’re too busy being a celebrity ex-wife,” ire challenged.


    Isolde picked up the top file and scanned the numbers. Her brain shifted gears instantly.


    “I’ll have it done by lunch,” Isolde said.


    ire rolled her eyes. “Sure. Good luck with that.”


    Isolde walked to the elevator without looking back. She had a dress to forget and an equation to solve.


    The Orbital engineering floor was silent, save for the soft clicks of a mouse and the low murmur of Isolde’s voice.


    She was in the zone. The Flow.


    The numbers on the screen weren’t merely data — they were anguage. She saw the satellite’s trajectory in her mind, a silver arc against the ck velvet of space. She felt the drag coefficients as physical weights pressing against her thoughts.


    ire stood by the coffee machine, watching. She had expected Isolde to give up an hour ago. Instead, Isolde hadn’t moved. She hadn’t checked her phone. Her left arm was held stiffly at her side, her right hand moving with unnerving precision between the keyboard and a high-sensitivity trackball mouse.


    Isolde’s fingers executedplexmands with an economy of motion, driven by custom macros. “Initiate diagnostic script,” she murmured, and code scrolled across a secondary monitor. She wasn’t typing — she was conducting an orchestra with a single baton.


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