#Chapter 143: The Aftermath

Agnes I sat at one of the communal workstations in the design department, my fingers mechanically working the fabric as I remade the dress. The old one had been torn beyond repair, Olivia’s claws having shredded both the material and my pride in one fell swoop. But maybe I could at least try to rebuild something beautiful from the ruins. My shoulders ached from hunching over the table since dawn. I’d barely slept last night, reliving the nightmare of the fashion show over and over again. The memory burned in my chest like acid, and I channeled that pain into my work, stitching with a ferocity that surprised even me. The new dress wasn’t at all like the old one. Elijah said that Thea wanted a different one, and honestly, so did I. So I had spent all morning—I’d even come to the design department a few hours early, arriving and getting to work before everyone else—sketching a design for something new and fresh, and now I was already working on the first prototype