The Riddle at the Gala

Elena smoothed the silk of her evening gown and adjusted her fascinator—a delicate hat of black feathers that framed her face like a dark halo. The charity gala at the museum was exactly where she needed to be tonight. Exactly where he would be.

She spotted him immediately across the ballroom, standing beneath the museum's Egyptian exhibit. Marcus. Her sphinx.

Three years ago, he'd posed the riddle that destroyed her life: "What's worth more than gold but costs nothing to give away?" She'd told him—trust. Then she'd handed him her client list, her passwords, her career. He'd smiled, taken everything, and vanished.

The irony wasn't lost on her that he'd chosen this venue. Behind him loomed the Great Sphinx replica, its stone face impassive, its riddles unanswered for millennia. Like Marcus, it offered questions without answers.

"You look expensive, Elena." His voice slid over her shoulder before she saw him approach.

"And you look like you're still running the same old pyramid scheme." She turned, finally, to face him. "New recruits at the bottom, you at the top, everyone else's money flowing upward."

Marcus laughed, a sound like glass breaking. "It's not a scheme if it works. You should know—you were going to be my queen."

The band struck up a waltz. He extended his hand. One dance, his eyes said. For old times' sake. For closure.

Elena stared at his hand. Three years ago, she would have taken it. Tonight, she adjusted her hat and smiled.

"The sphinx ate its own heart when it couldn't solve its own riddle," she said. "I solved mine. The answer wasn't trust. It was revenge."

She walked away, leaving him standing beneath the stone gaze of the ancient sphinx. By tomorrow, the SEC would have everything. Her parting gift, wrapped in a bow. Her riddle, finally answered.