Chapter 21 - The Shadows of New York
Far from the tranquil embrace of the Vermont mountains, the glass-and-steel canyons of Manhattan hummed with relentless energy, completely indifferent to the fallen giants of its past. Inside a modest, cramped apartment in Queens, Sienna Blake stared at her reflection in a cracked bathroom mirror. Gone were the designer gowns, the VIP club memberships, and the corporate expense accounts that once defined her existence. Now, she wore a simple uniform, working double shifts as an administrative assistant at a local logistics firm just to make rent and pay off her remaining court-mandated restitution. Her phone buzzed on the kitchen counter—an automated alert regarding a public architectural seminar being held across the river at Columbia University. The guest speaker list caught her eye: Clare Mercer, Chairperson of the Vance-Mercer Foundation. Sienna’s breath hitched. For a brief second, old bitterness prickled beneath her skin, but it was quickly washed away by a heavy, sobering wave of exhaustion. She closed her laptop, turned off her phone, and walked back out to her desk to finish her paperwork. The past was a relentless ghost, but she was finally learning that the only way to silence it was to stop feeding it.
