The rooftop air crackled with the static charge of impending disaster as the helicopter's rotor blades churned the sky into a tempest. Isabella's manicured grip on her champagne flute faltered, Veuve Clicquot sloshing onto her custom Manolos as the banner unfurled in lurid sequined glory:
SOPHIA STERLING, I LOVE YOU!
For three heartbeats, the only sounds were the quartet's discordant cello screech and the click-click-click of Wu Di's jaw detaching from her skull. Then the livestream exploded:
[@ChaosConnoisseur]: PLOT TWIST OF THE CENTURY
[@Isababy4Never]: LUCIAN'S A DOUBLE AGENT??
[@MamaGirlMilitia]: BOW TO YOUR QUEEN
Isabella's porcelain facade fissured—a spiderweb of rage creeping from her twitching left eyelid to her collagen-plumped lips. "This… this isn't…" she rasped, mascara bleeding into the hollows of her eyes as she wheeled toward the safety rail. Below, paparazzi drones swarmed like cybernetic vultures, capturing her Gucci-clad stumble.
Sophia observed the carnage from her perch atop an abandoned catering cart, iced latte in hand. The drink sweated rivulets onto her Balmain blazer, but she didn't care—the acidic tang of burnt dreams wafting from Isabella's imploding entourage was perfume enough.
"Darling," she purred into the sudden silence, plucking a rose petal from her hair. "If you wanted my autograph, you could've DMed like a normal stalker."
The insult detonated the tension.
Manager Wu lunged, iPhone raised like a sacrificial dagger. "You scheming b—"
Thwack.
A stray drone collided with Wu's forehead, its propellers entangling in her extensions as it broadcast her shriek globally. The quartet, sensing career suicide, abandoned their instruments and leapt into the fleeing crowd.
"Careful," Sophia called after them, "those violins are worth more than your life savings!"
Meanwhile: 5th Avenue Heliport
Lucian Vaughn paced the tarmac, his Tom Ford oxfords scuffing asphalt as he screamed into his BlackBerry. "I said pink petals! PINK! Do I look like a fucking funeral director?!"
The pilot's tinny defense ("The florist said crimson screams passion!") drowned under the roar of Isabella's real helicopter arriving—two hours late, trailing a bedraggled banner reading Happy 16th Jessica! in Comic Sans.
"Goddamn it!" Lucian hurled his cigar into a fuel puddle, ignoring the ground crew's shouts. "That's the third prenup this month!"
His phone lit up with Isabella's 47 missed calls. He silenced it, opting instead to watch Sophia's viral triumph on Bloomberg's rooftop LED screen. Her laugh—rich, mocking, alive—echoed through the financial district as the camera zoomed in on her tossing a rose into the Hudson.
"You win this round, Sterling," he muttered, trudging toward a waiting Uber. "But the war's just—"
Splat.
A drone-dropped éclair from the rooftop afterparty smeared across his Brioni lapel. The livestream chat howled.
Chen Family Compound: 9:47 PM
Yanchen Chen knelt on ancestral marble, the scent of his father's 30-year Moutai wafting between the golf club's backswings.
"Eight million yuan!" Old Man Li bellowed, hefting his 9-iron like a samurai sword. "For petals and bad pop music?!"
Yanchen kept his gaze lowered, tracking the shadow of the club's arc. "Respectfully, Father, the viral ROI—"
Whoosh.
The club grazed his left ear, embedding itself in a Ming vase. Porcelain shards skittered across the floor like fleeing cockroaches.
"Your mother's dowry paid for that!" Li roared, face purpling. "You'll marry the Sterling girl by moon festival or—"
Brrring.
Yanchen's phone lit up with Sophia's custom caller ID—a glittering poop emoji. "May I?"
Li's snarl faltered at the sight of Sterling Group's logo. "Put her on speaker!"
"Yanchen," Sophia's voice dripped honeyed venom through the line. "Your little skywrite proposal was… quaint. Tell me—" A champagne cork popped in the background. "—did the prenup include clauses for aerial humiliation?"
Old Man Li's golf club clattered to the floor.
Yanchen straightened his tie, victory sweet on his tongue. "I'll draft revisions tonight. Perhaps a rider for drone insurance?"
Sophia's laugh crackled through the speaker. "Bring it to dinner. Mother wants to discuss merging our cybersecurity teams." She paused. "Oh, and wear something fire-resistant. Isabella's fans are… creative with molotov hashtags."
The line went dead.
Li stared at his son, then at the shattered vase, then at the livestream replaying Sophia's rooftop coronation on CNBC. Slowly, he retrieved his club.
"Double the dowry," he grunted, stomping toward his study. "And burn that hideous helicopter."
Epilogue: Sterling Penthouse
Eleanor Sterling scrolled through the Wall Street Journal's front page—Sterling Heiress Hijacks Rival's Proposal, Stock Soars 18%—while her daughter slow-danced with a drone in the living room.
"Must you gloat so vulgarly?"
Sophia dipped the whirring machine, its camera light winking. "Gloating's 70% of our market cap, Mother."
Outside, the city glittered like a circuit board of possibilities. Somewhere below, Isabella's lawyers drafted cease-and-desist letters. In Hong Kong, Yanchen revised prenups with clauses for "aerodynamic assets." At Royal Entertainment, executives scrambled to trademark Helicopter Heartbreak: The Musical.
But high above it all, Sophia Sterling smiled—not the camera-ready smirk of corporate warfare, but the private, feral grin of a girl who'd turned her mother's gilded cage into a weapon.
The script was hers now.
And the world would read every damn word.