PART 3: THE PRICE OF PRIDE
The grand wedding arch outside in the garden
was decorated with white roses.
Two hundred guests were waiting.
Members of high society,
politicians,
tech executives.
They were drinking champagne.
Waiting for the music to start.
They didn’t know the empire had already fallen inside.
Inside the ballroom,
the atmosphere was thick with the scent of ruin.
Chloe was on the floor,
her beautiful white dress stained with gray dust.
The reality was setting in.
Her dream was dead.
Her freedom was at risk.
“Security,” Genevieve ordered.
Two large men Ranked out from the corners of the room.
They grabbed Chloe by her arms.
They lifted her off the floor.
“Let go of me!” Chloe screamed,
kicking her legs.
Her expensive heels flew off.
One hit the wall,
breaking the glass of a family portrait.
“Ethan!
You coward!
You promised me everything!
You’re nothing without your money anyway!”
They dragged her out through the side doors.
Her screams faded into the long corridors.
She wouldn’t be going to a honeymoon in Cabo.
She would be going to an interrogation room at the precinct.
Victoria was trembling so hard she could barely stand.
She looked at her son.
Ethan was looking at the floor.
He had accepted his fate.
He knew Genevieve Consecour.
In the business world,
she was known as the Iron Widow.
She never gave a second chance.
“Madam Consecour,” Victoria whispered,
her voice cracking with old age and sudden terror.
“My jewelry…
my assets.
Can I keep them?”
Genevieve turned her head slowly.
She gave Victoria a look of pure pity.
“Everything you own was bought with Vance Group credit lines.
Those lines are canceled.
Harrison will audit your personal safe by five PM today.
If you hid a single diamond, I will file criminal charges.”
Victoria sank into a nearby chair.
The bronze dress looked cheap now.
Like tin.
Genevieve walked toward the main doors leading to the garden.
Her grey maid uniform felt heavier than any designer gown.
She liked the weight of it.
It reminded her of where she started thirty years ago,
before the billions.
Before the power.
Ethan followed her,
this head bowed low.
“What about the guests, Chairwoman?
How do we explain this?”
Genevieve stopped at the threshold.
She looked out at the sea of rich people in the garden.
They were laughing,
oblivious to the storm.
“You don’t explain anything,” Genevieve said.
She unbuttoned the cuffs of her gray shirt
and rolled them up.
“Go out there.
Tell them the wedding is off because the bride is a criminal
and the groom is broke.
Let them see the truth.
High society loves an execution.”
“And you?” Ethan asked.
“I have a business to run,” Genevieve said.
“And a floor to finish.”
She didn’t wait for his reply.
She walked past him,
heading toward the back exit where her armored Maybach was waiting.
Harrison followed her,
closing his briefcase with a sharp snap.
As Genevieve stepped out into the clean afternoon air,
she took a deep breath.
The air smelled like rain.
Like change.
Behind her, inside the mansion,
she heard the first sounds of high society realizing the party was over.
The music stopped.
The murmurs began.
Chloe would spend her night in a holding cell.
Victoria would spend her night packing cheap suitcases for Montana.
And Ethan would start his first shift at the warehouse at six AM tomorrow.
Genevieve got into the back seat of the Maybach.
The glass was tinted black.
The world outside disappeared.
She looked at her hands.
They were still slightly damp from the soapy water.
She smiled.
A small, stoic smile.
“Where to, Chairwoman?”
the driver asked.
“The office,” Genevieve said,
leaning her head back against the leather.
May you like
“We have a lot of trash to clear out today.”
