Chapter 2 - THE BALLROOM DOORS
The ballroom applauded Nathaniel and Sabrina like they were already a couple everyone had agreed to accept.
Sabrina lifted her hand deliberately, making sure the diamond caught the chandelier light. Nathaniel kissed her.
“Adeline’s finished,” he said. “Tonight, you take her place.” The doors opened.
Adeline stood there, pale but upright. Sabrina laughed.
“You should’ve stayed unconscious. I already stole the husband, the ring, and the life.”
Nathaniel did not defend his wife.
“Go home. Nobody here wants the discarded wife.”
Adeline took one step forward.
Sabrina crossed the distance and ripped the gold heirloom bracelet from Adeline’s wrist. Adeline recoiled.
“Even your dead grandmother’s jewelry looks better on me.” Jasper moved.
He stepped between them.
Nathaniel reached for the microphone.
Jasper knocked his father’s hand away once.
“Touch her again and I bury everything you built.” Nathaniel froze.
Then Jasper raised the microphone.
“Dad... ask Sabrina where the sixty-eight million went.”
The room stopped breathing. Sabrina’s smile vanished.
Nathaniel slowly turned toward her. Adeline stared.
Sabrina covered the stolen bracelet with her other hand.
Jasper did not know where the sixty-eight million went.
That was the point.
He knew only that an auditor had identified sixty-eight million dollars in transactions requiring explanation.
Sabrina’s terror told him she knew something about that review.
Nathaniel’s face told Jasper his father had not expected her reaction.
Within minutes, the gala split into three different realities.
Guests thought they had witnessed a family scandal.
Foundation staff thought they had witnessed a governance crisis.
Nathaniel thought he had just discovered his mistress might have hidden financial information from him.
Adeline thought only one thing.
Someone had used her name while she was weak enough to be dismissed.
Then Nathaniel leaned toward Sabrina.
May you like
“What does he mean?” She said nothing.
For the first time that night, the woman who had walked into the ballroom wearing another woman’s marriage looked afraid of a number.
