Chapter 1 - The Cruel Toast
The parents’ dining room just outside Charlotte was supposed to be filled with the warmth of a Christmas Eve celebration. Glowing fairy lights twinkled against the fully decorated Christmas tree, illuminating the red-and-gold ornaments and the evergreen mantel garlands. Fifteen adult relatives sat around the long table, a massive brisket and a birthday cake resting in the center. But the atmosphere was suffocatingly toxic.
Ray, a man in his early sixties with graying hair and a burgundy checked shirt, stood at the head of the table holding a crystal bourbon glass.
He looked down at his son, Carter, who was turning thirty today. Carter sat quietly, his short brown hair neat, wearing a sharp navy blazer over a charcoal shirt.
Ray raised his bourbon glass toward Carter with a cruel, mocking smirk. "Thirty years old," Ray announced loudly, ensuring every relative heard him, "and still the biggest disappointment I ever created."
Several relatives chuckled briefly, sipping their wine. Standing near the kitchen, Dylan—Carter’s brother in his late twenties wearing a cream sweater—held up his smartphone, recording the humiliation with a vicious smile.
Sitting beside Carter, his girlfriend Shelby tightened her jaw. Her shoulder-length brown hair fell over her elegant emerald dress as she leaned in. "Carter, let's go," she whispered fiercely.
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Carter gave her a small, reassuring nod. He didn't scream. He didn't cry. He calmly stood up, reaching inside his jacket to pull out a sealed, cream-colored envelope.
👉 Carter placed the envelope beside his father’s glass, entirely unaware that he was about to detonate a multi-million-dollar bomb.
