Chapter 2

The whispers started before the ink dried.

"She actually signed it? Just like that?"

"Poor thing. She built that company from the ground up."

"Did you hear what Camille said? The twins are hers. Elara was basically an unpaid surrogate and a free CEO."

"Two hundred thousand for eight years? That's less than his monthly wine budget."

The gala crowd buzzed with a mixture of pity and morbid fascination. I could feel their eyes crawling over me—the discarded wife, the public fool.

My mother was shaking. Not from sadness. From rage.

She stepped forward, her voice cutting through the murmurs like a blade. "Viktor Ashford, you ungrateful snake." The crowd went quiet. "When I met you, you didn't have shoes that matched. My daughter bought you your first suit for your first investor meeting. She co-signed your first lease. When your mother was dying in that county hospital, who paid for her transfer to Mount Sinai? Who sat with her every night for three months? My daughter."

Viktor's jaw tightened. "Margaret, this isn't the time—"

"Oh, it's exactly the time!" My mother's voice cracked with fury. "You begged us—begged—for our blessing when you proposed. You stood in our kitchen and swore on your dead mother's grave that you would protect Elara. And now you parade your mistress in front of four hundred people and call my daughter a nanny?"

Camille rolled her eyes. "This is getting embarrassing. Viktor, can we wrap this up?"

My father, who had been silent in the corner, stood. He was seventy-two, recovering from a triple bypass, and had no business being this angry. But he walked straight up to Viktor, his face carved from stone.

"You are the worst investment my family ever made," he said, his voice low and trembling. "We poured everything into you. And you—" He jabbed a finger into Viktor's chest. "—you are nothing without her."

Viktor brushed his hand away like swatting a fly. "Security."

Two guards materialized instantly, flanking my father.

"Escort Mr. and Mrs. Voss out. They're causing a scene."

"Don't you dare touch him!" I stepped between them, my voice sharp enough to freeze the guards in place.

But Viktor waved them forward. "Remove them. Now."

My father's face went red, then white. He clutched his chest.

"Dad!" I caught him as he stumbled. His breath came in short, ragged gasps. My mother screamed his name.

The crowd erupted into chaos—guests scrambling, someone shouting to call 911, chairs scraping against marble floors.

And Viktor? Viktor stood there, adjusting his cufflinks.

"Drama runs in the family, I see," Camille murmured, sipping her sparkling water.

A hand appeared on my shoulder—steady, warm, calm. I looked up.

Dominic Thorne.

He was already guiding a paramedic team through the crowd, his phone pressed to his ear, barking orders with the quiet authority of a man used to controlling rooms. Tall, dark-haired, jaw like it was cut from granite. His presence alone seemed to push the chaos back.

He knelt beside my father, checking his pulse with practiced hands. "He's stable, but he needs to get to a hospital. I have a car outside."

Viktor's eyes narrowed. "Thorne? What are you doing at my gala?"

Dominic didn't even look at him. His focus stayed on my father, his voice low and reassuring as the paramedics loaded him onto a stretcher.

"Elara," Dominic said quietly, standing. "Go with your father. I'll handle things here."

I hesitated, glancing back at the signed settlement on the table.

"Go," he repeated. His dark eyes met mine, and something passed between us—something I couldn't name. "That paper means nothing. Trust me."

I wanted to ask what he meant. But my father groaned, and my mother was crying, and the paramedics were moving fast.

So I left.

I walked out of Viktor Ashford's gala, past the champagne towers and the string quartet, past the whispers and the stares, past the woman wearing my life like a stolen dress.

And I didn't look back.

But as the doors closed behind me, I heard Camille's voice, bright and triumphant:

"Finally. Now let's celebrate properly."

She had no idea that the celebration she was planning was for her own destruction.