Chapter 2 Ghost Skin ,Bare Bones

---

Geneva was quieter than she expected.

Not just in sound, but in sensation.

The cab from the airport hummed through icy streets lined with tall glass buildings and trimmed hedges that didn't dare grow out of line. Everything here felt... intentional. Sterile. Curated.

The opposite of her marriage.

She said nothing as the driver tried to make small talk in a gentle French accent. She simply nodded, stared out the window, and kept one hand gripping the handle of her suitcase - like if she let go, she might come undone.

He dropped her off at a small, temporary rental flat in the Plainpalais district.

Three rooms. One key. No questions.

Perfect.

---

Inside, the walls were pale and unremarkable. The radiator sputtered to life as she stepped inside, shoes wet from melting snow.

No candles.

No welcome basket.

No warmth.

Just air and silence and the soft crackle of distance between her past and this hollow new now.

She didn't turn on the lights. Instead, she walked to the narrow window overlooking the gray skyline and sat on the edge of the bed - just as she had done that night before she left.

She sat for a long time.

Her body was still. Her mind wasn't.

> What do you do with yourself when everything you were was for someone else?

---

There was no crying.

She had already bled out all the softness.

This was a different grief now.

Cold.

Sharp.

Productive.

She reached into her carry-on and pulled out a small notebook.

Not the expensive leather-bound planner Lucas once gifted her - the one with their initials stamped in gold.

That one stayed in Florence.

This one was plain, spiral-bound, and stolen from the hotel minibar last fall during a conference she had attended alone.

She flipped to the first page.

And wrote:

> "Moreau.

Skin that remembers. Beauty that doesn't apologize."

She paused.

Underlined it.

> "Skincare for women who will never be second choice again."

---

It was midnight by the time she stopped scribbling.

Her hand ached. Her back burned. Her eyes throbbed.

But her chest... was lighter.

The idea was barely a seed.

But it was hers.

It didn't belong to a man. Or a shadow. Or a version of her groomed to please someone else.

It belonged to Selina Moreau.

And for now, that was enough.

---

Flashback: One Year Ago

Naomi sat across from her in a café in Florence, stirring sugar into a too-strong cappuccino.

"You ever think about doing your own thing?" Naomi asked.

Selina had smiled tightly. "Lucas likes me home when he gets back."

Naomi blinked. "So you're his furniture now?"

She laughed it off then.

But the question stayed.

---

Present.

The next morning, Selina bundled herself into a borrowed wool coat and stepped outside.

The air bit through the fabric like truth.

It was freezing.

She walked anyway.

Past closed boutiques and shuttered cafés.

Past couples hand-in-hand.

Past the kind of lives she once dreamed of having.

She found a bench by the lake. Sat. Watched her breath rise into the sky like prayers she didn't believe in anymore.

She pulled her notebook from her bag and kept writing.

---

For the next five days, that was her rhythm:

Wake. Walk. Write. Wander. Sleep.

Sometimes she skipped meals.

Sometimes she forgot what time it was.

But every page filled with something new:

Product formulas

Brand names

Taglines

Words like resurrect, velvet rage, no more pretending

She didn't check social media.

Didn't call Naomi.

Didn't respond to her mother's texts.

The world could wait.

She was busy coming back to life.

---

Until it found her again.

One week after her arrival in Geneva, Selina walked into a tiny café near Rue du Rhône.

Ordered a tea. Sat alone with her back to the window.

She had just opened her notebook when she heard it - a soft chime from her old email inbox.

Subject Line: "Is this you?"

It was from Naomi.

Attached was a screenshot of a gossip site headline:

> Lucas Hart Reunites with First Love Amara Devereux – Spotted at Florence Airport with Luggage in Hand.

There was a photo.

Lucas - tall, groomed, expression unreadable.

Amara - laughing beside him, stylish, radiant.

Together.

Like it was never a secret.

Like Selina had been the footnote all along.

---

She didn't cry.

Didn't scream.

Didn't throw the phone.

She just stared.

And for the first time in years, her fingers curled into fists.

It wasn't about the affair.

It wasn't even about Amara.

It was about how easy it was for him to move on.

To be seen in public.

To start fresh - while she was starting from scratch.

It was about how no one knew what it cost her to leave.

---

Selina stood slowly. Her tea untouched. Her notebook left behind.

She walked back into the cold.

She didn't know where she was going.

But she knew one thing:

> She wasn't going to stay small.

Not anymore.

Not ever again.

---

The air bit at her skin as she stepped back out onto the street, but Selina didn't flinch.

She let the cold hurt her.

Let it sting her cheeks and slice through the layers she had wrapped so tightly around herself since leaving Florence.

She needed to feel something that wasn't humiliation.

She walked without direction, her boots loud against cobblestones slick from last night's rain.

Amara.

Of course it was Amara.

Always Amara.

Beautiful. Effortless. Unbothered.

The woman who never tried to be anything but herself - and still managed to be enough.

Selina had bent herself into every shape to keep Lucas looking her way.

But Amara... Amara just existed, and he came running.

---

Her phone buzzed again.

Naomi.

This time, she answered.

No words - just the sound of air between them, stretching across countries and years of knowing each other.

"Please tell me you didn't see it," Naomi said gently.

"I did," Selina replied.

It was the first time her voice had cracked the silence in nearly eight days.

Rough. Flat. But real.

Naomi exhaled. "Selina..."

"I'm fine," she lied.

"No, you're not."

Silence.

Then: "But you will be."

---

Back at the flat, Selina dropped her coat and sank into the armchair by the window.

Phone still pressed to her ear.

Breathing through the burn in her chest.

"I keep wondering," she whispered. "Was I ever really there? In that marriage?"

Naomi's voice was low. "You were. That's why it hurt."

Another pause.

Selina let her head fall back, staring at the ceiling. "I saw myself in her, you know? I saw it the moment I met her. The hair, the smile, the voice. She was the original."

"And he picked you because you looked like his memory," Naomi said bitterly.

Selina didn't respond.

She didn't need to.

---

"I'm going to start it," she said instead.

Naomi blinked. "Start what?"

"My company."

"You mean Moreau Beauty?"

Selina nodded slowly, even though Naomi couldn't see it. "I'm done waiting to be chosen. I'm done hiding. I don't care if it fails - I need to build something that's mine. That no one can take away."

Naomi's silence turned sharp with energy.

"Say no more. I'm in."

Selina blinked. "What?"

"I'm quitting that soulless PR firm tomorrow. You'll need branding. Strategy. Operations. Press. I've got you."

"Naomi-"

"You spent years shrinking to make people comfortable. Now it's your turn to take up space."

---

Selina felt something warm flicker in her chest.

Not joy.

Not hope.

But the start of both.

And maybe that was enough for now.

---

That night, she sat cross-legged on the floor, laptop open, a half-empty glass of wine by her knee.

Her fingers hovered over the keyboard.

Then typed:

> "Moreau Beauty: Skin for the woman who will never apologize again."

She looked at the words for a long time.

Then saved the file.

Closed the screen.

And let herself smile - just a little.

---

Somewhere else in Geneva.

A man stood at the edge of a balcony overlooking the lake.

Tall. Sharp-suited. Quiet.

In his hand, a tablet lit with a dossier.

Name: Selina Moreau.

Status: Divorced. Relocated. Unknown business project.

He read the file in silence, his brow furrowed.

At the bottom of the page, an old surveillance photo of her - blurry, taken through café glass two years ago.

She'd been crying.

He remembered that day.

He hadn't stepped in then.

He would now.