I pulled my portfolio closer.

The worn leather was warm from my hands. I reached past the familiar patent drafts and unfastened a hidden inner sleeve.

"There's something else," I said quietly.

Raven paused. She tilted her head. "What do you mean?"

"The last three months," I said. "When things started feeling wrong. When Mason stopped looking me in the eye."

I remembered those nights. Mason would fall asleep, exhausted from dinner meetings, smelling of scotch. As soon as his breathing turned heavy, I would slip out of bed. I sat on the floor by our cracked window with a small clip-on light.

I didn't draw for his company. I didn't draw to solve his production costs. I drew for myself.

I pulled out the new stack of thick vellum and laid it on the kitchen table.

There were twenty sheets. The lines were fierce and razor-sharp. At the center of the collection was my old skyline design—the one Mason had stripped down and turned into cheap, mass-market plastic. But here, it was reborn. It was bold, dynamic, and unapologetic. It was pure instinct.

Raven leaned over the table. She didn't say a word.

The hum of the yellow lightbulb filled the kitchen. Raven turned one sheet, then another. Her fingers hovered over the dark graphite strokes. She looked at the curves, the modular joints, the sheer daring of the structure.

A full minute passed. The silence stretched thin.

Finally, Raven looked up. Her eyes were wide. The sharp, cynical lawyer was completely gone.

"Eliza," she whispered. Her voice shook a little. "We need Thomas Bishop to see this."

***

Raven made three phone calls before sunrise. By ten in the morning, we had an appointment.

Thomas Bishop’s studio was on the top floor of a cast-iron building in SoHo. The space was huge and dusty. It smelled like cedar wood, ink, and forty years of design history. Award plaques sat facedown on low shelves. Sketches and fabric swatches covered every flat surface.

Thomas stood behind a massive oak worktable. He was in his late sixties, with a shock of white hair and a heavy, rumpled wool sweater. He didn't smile when we walked in. He barely nodded at Raven.

"You have twenty minutes, Greene," he grunted. His voice was gravelly. He looked at me. "I don't look at iPads. If it’s on a screen, take it back to Brooklyn."

"It's not on a screen," I said.

I walked over to his table. I set my battered leather folder down on the dark oak. The scuffed straps looked out of place in the grand studio, but I didn't apologize for them.

I unbuckled the brass clasp and opened the folder.

Thomas adjusted his glasses. He pulled the first sheet toward him.

The studio went dead quiet. The only sound was the faint rumble of the street below and the rustle of heavy paper.

Thomas turned the first page. He didn't react. He turned the second. His thick fingers moved slowly, methodically. He traced a line on the third draft, his thumb pausing over a structural joint.

He reached the last page. He didn't speak.

Instead, he turned the entire stack over. He went back to page one and started again.

This time, he leaned closer. His posture changed. The bored, tired slump in his shoulders vanished. His jaw tightened.

When he finally looked up, the polite mask was gone. His pale blue eyes were wide. For five seconds, he just stared at me. It was a look I hadn't seen in five long years.

It was pure, undeniable awe.

"Who else has seen these?" Thomas asked.

"Just Raven," I said.

Thomas closed the folder with a flat, heavy thud. He didn't take his hand off the leather.

"I have an open consulting seat on my advisory board," he said, his voice flat and deliberate. "It comes with a studio, a full retainer, and complete creative control. It’s yours. Starting right now."

My breath caught in my chest.

Raven crossed her arms by the doorway, a small, knowing grin touching her lips.

"Mr. Bishop," I began, my voice tighter than I wanted. "You don't need to do that out of charity. Mason’s PR team—"

"I don't give a damn about your ex-husband's PR team," Thomas cut in.

He stepped around the table. He stood directly in front of me, choosing each word like a stone he was laying into a wall.

"This isn't competent work, Eliza," Thomas said. His voice dropped into a low, steady register. "It's exceptional. It’s hungry. It has teeth. I spent thirty years watching suits grind this kind of vision into dust so they could sell it in bulk. I thought this town had completely killed it."

He looked down at my battered folder, then back into my eyes.

"You didn't let them kill it."

A sudden, sharp sting hit the back of my throat.

Five years of Patricia calling my talent a "cute little hobby." Five years of Mason taking my drafts and locking them in his desk. Five years of telling myself I was selfish for wanting my own name on the door.

It all hit me at once, heavy and suffocating.

I turned my head. I had to look out the tall industrial window, staring at the water towers and fire escapes of SoHo until my eyes cleared. I took one slow, deep breath.

When I turned back, my voice was steady.

"When do I start?" I asked.

Thomas smiled for the first time. It was a sharp, wolfish grin.

"Right now," he said. "Let's go build something they can't steal."