Chapter 1 - THE SCRIPT IN THE DARK
Beneath heavy surgical dressings, my eyes burned like hot sand. Three days ago, I walked into an elite private surgical suite for what my older brother, Daniel, swore was a simple corrective procedure on a strained retinal tear. Now, I sat locked inside the isolated guest suite of his gated Connecticut estate, completely unable to tell midnight from noon.
Daniel had taken my cell phone. He dismissed my private driver, cancelled my crucial post-op checkup, and told the house staff that the doctor demanded absolute quiet and sensory deprivation.
Then he came into my room with a document that smelled of fresh laser toner.
For eleven years, ever since our mother died of exhaustion working two custodial jobs, Daniel had acted as my manager. He collected twenty percent of every arena tour, bought himself luxury sports cars, and routinely told national interviewers that he was the saint who raised me from childhood. He always conveniently forgot that my very first publishing check bought the house he lived in when I was barely seventeen years old.
"Sign, Lena," he said, pressing a heavy fountain pen into my shaking fingers. "Nobody expects a broken woman to read fine print. You sing. I pocket the millions. And you stay in this room forever if that’s what it takes."
When I hesitated, his thumb deliberately pinched the raw, inflamed incision beneath the tape on my temple. The pain sparked white-hot behind the darkness, but I swallowed my tears and let him wrench my wrist down across the parchment.
He didn't care that the signature was a trembling scrawl. He immediately dialled his buyer, boasting that my entire multi-platinum music catalog was finally under his absolute corporate control, awaiting only the authentication of my original master files.
He locked the heavy oak door behind him, entirely unaware of one vital truth: our mother had cleaned recording studios for decades. She had watched legendary artists die penniless because they trusted managers who called ownership mere paperwork. Before she passed, she gave me a single piece of advice: "Keep what you make."
I had secretly placed my copyrights and master files under an independent estate trust years ago. And when Daniel set up this room, he foolishly allowed me to keep my bespoke, voice-activated accessibility terminal—assuming a blind sister merely needed a tool to turn on bedside lamps.
As his footsteps faded toward the terrace, I turned to the small, unblinking microphone beside my pillow.
"Good evening, Iris."
May you like
A clean chime sounded in the quiet room.
I steadied my breath, touched the mother-of-pearl locket against my collarbone, and gave the command that would dismantle his empire: "Open my private messages."
