Khloe blinked, surprised by the reply.

Diana’s voice remained light. “Especially weeds. There’s something satisfying about removing something invasive from the root.”

For the first time, Khloe’s smile faltered.

Only for a second.

But Diana saw it.

Then she walked past her, took the elevator down to accounting, and packed her few personal items into a cardboard box. A ceramic mug. A potted succulent. A fountain pen her grandfather had given her when she was eighteen. A framed photograph of her and Arthur taken in the early days, before the private jets, before the keynote speeches, before his smile learned arrogance.

She held the photograph a moment.

In it, Arthur wore an off-the-rack suit and looked proud simply to stand beside her. Diana wore a blue dress and no jewelry except her mother’s earrings. They looked young. More than that, they looked real.

She set the frame carefully in the trash.

Ben, the lobby security guard, saw her leaving with the box and straightened from his station.

“Mrs. Miller,” he said, because at Ethere she was Diana Miller. “Is everything all right?”

She gave him a small smile. “It will be.”

Outside, Seattle was cold and wet, the kind of rain that did not fall dramatically but simply occupied the air. Diana crossed the pavement to her modest Honda Civic while Arthur’s Porsche sat in the reserved CEO space near the entrance. She placed the box on the passenger seat and rested both hands on the steering wheel.

For almost one minute, she did not move.

Not because she was broken.

Because she was saying goodbye to the version of herself who had waited too long.

Then she started the car.

She did not go home.

Home was a Mercer Island house with glass walls, cedar beams, heated floors, and a view Arthur bragged about at dinner parties as though he had wrestled it from the earth himself. Home was held by the Frost Family Trust. Arthur had never read the deed. Men who believe everything belongs to them rarely check paperwork.

Instead, Diana drove downtown to an unmarked black tower near the waterfront. There was no logo on the building, no directory announcing what occupied the top floors. Only polished stone, private security, and an underground garage that recognized her license plate before the gate lifted.

Oberon Capital.

The elevator took her straight to the penthouse level.

When the doors opened, the air changed.

Gone was the chatter of cubicles and office coffee. Here there was silence, art, thick carpet, mahogany paneling, and assistants who moved with the quiet urgency of people trusted with serious money. Sarah at reception stood immediately.

“Good afternoon, Ms. Frost.”

“Good afternoon. Are they here?”

“In the primary boardroom.”

Diana carried the cardboard box down the corridor.

Inside the boardroom sat three people her grandfather had trusted more than most blood relatives.