Ice And Adoration 2 – Karis Chan (1)

I’m not angry, I’m disappointed. The words echoed in her mind, the family mantra, the silken rope that had bound her for years. Her phone buzzed again. Arthur: Vehicle is staged at the service exit. Move on your signal. This was it. The parole hearing. She took one last look around the dark room, a luxurious cell she had paid for herself. Taking a ragged breath, she walked to her bedroom door, opened it, and stepped into the hallway. The penthouse was still. Too still. Andrea was waiting, Stella could feel it.

She forced her steps to be slow, slightly unsteady, one hand pressed to her temple in a pantomime of agony. She had to sell this. Her freedom depended on it. She made it to the main living area, her eyes fixed on the elevator that led down to the service bay. She was almost there. “Stella?” Andrea’s voice was soft, but it cut through the moment like a whip.

Stella froze, her back to the guest suite. She didn’t turn around. “I thought I’d get some air,” she mumbled, her voice hoarse. “The pressure in my head… maybe a drive.” “A drive? Honey, you can barely stand,” Andrea said, her voice closer now. Stella could hear the soft slip of her slippers on the marble floor.

“Let me call your doctor.” “No,” Stella said, a little too sharply. She softened her tone, forcing a pained weariness into it. “No doctors. I just… I need darkness and motion. Arthur can take me. He knows the drill.” A beat of silence stretched, thick with suspicion. Stella could feel her mother’s analytical gaze on her back, dissecting the slump of her shoulders, the angle of her head. It was a battle of wills fought in absolute quiet. Andrea was searching for the lie, the crack in her performance.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except for brief quotations in book reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Published by Karis Chan First Edition: 2026 OceanofPDF.com Contents Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen Chapter Seventeen Chapter Eighteen Chapter Nineteen Chapter Twenty Chapter Twenty-One Chapter Twenty-Two Chapter Twenty-Three Chapter Twenty-Four Chapter Twenty-Five Chapter Twenty-Six Chapter Twenty-Seven OceanofPDF.com Chapter One The world narrowed to a tunnel of blinding white light and the frantic, tinny voice of the stage manager crackling in her in-ear monitor.

The custom- molded plastic felt like a cold, alien pebble lodged deep in her ear canal. “—on my mark in five… four…” Five seconds. The entire sprawling, glittering expanse of her life, a decade of carefully curated perfection, had been compressed into five seconds. Her fingers, slick with a sudden, clammy sweat, felt alien on the familiar gloss of her guitar’s body.

The instrument, usually an extension of herself, a comforting weight against her torso, now felt like a shield and a burden all at once. The air, thick with the artificial chill of the arena and the faint, acrid tang of theatrical fog, felt too thin to breathe. It smelled of electricity and anticipation, a scent she usually thrived on, but tonight it was the sterile smell of an operating room.

“—three… two…” Her gaze was locked, a frantic pendulum swinging between two impossible choices. To her right, in the wings, stood Marcus Vance, her manager—the man who measured her life in quarterly earnings and brand metrics—his face a pale, furious mask in the gloom.

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

Book Information

• Unique ID: 78c5087c2213354f
• File Extension: .pdf
• File Size: 1,096,463 bytes (1.046 MB)
• Title: –
• Author: Unknown
• Pages: 310
• Language: English (en)

Reading & Word Statistics

• Estimated Reading Time: 493.59 minutes
• Total Words: 98,718
• Total Characters: 565,243
• Average Words per Page: 318.45
• Average Characters per Page: 1823.36

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