Chapter 2 - The Mask Falls
Chloe stood frozen on the sidewalk as Liam guided his mother toward a sleek, black Rolls-Royce Phantom that had silently pulled up to the curb. A uniformed driver stepped out, bowed deeply to the old woman in the frayed coat, and opened the rear door.
"Ma'am. Sir. Everything has been prepared," the driver announced respectfully.
Chloe’s phone buzzed violently in her purse. Then it buzzed again. And again. A non-stop barrage of notifications.
Tears of fury blinding her, she pulled out her phone. Her family’s group chat was exploding.
Father: Chloe! What did you do?! Why did Vance Enterprises just pull out of the merger?! Mother: Chloe, answer your phone! The bank just froze our corporate accounts! Brother: We’re ruined! The board is calling an emergency meeting! Who did you offend?!
A cold sweat broke out across Chloe’s neck. Vance Enterprises? The multi-billion-dollar conglomerate that owned half the real estate in the nation? What did they have to do with Liam? Liam was just a middle-management executive at a tech startup!
She scrambled to her feet, running toward the Rolls-Royce just as the driver was about to close the door.
"Liam! Wait!" she screamed, banging her polished fingernails against the tinted glass. "What is happening?! What did you do to my family’s business?!"
The window rolled down halfway. Liam looked at her, his expression utterly devoid of emotion.
"You always thought I was a nobody, Chloe," Liam said calmly. "You thought I worked hard just to buy you designer bags and tolerate your cruel little games. You thought my mother was a peasant because she chooses to live simply and walk among the people she helps."
The old woman leaned into the window’s frame. Up close, without the shadow of the streetlights, her eyes held an unmistakable command—the eyes of Evelyn Vance, the reclusive matriarch of Vance Enterprises, a woman who hadn't been seen in public for five years following a rumored internal coup.
"My son wanted a woman who loved him for who he was, not for his title," Evelyn said, her tone cutting like a razor. "So he hid his name. He pretended to be an ordinary man to see if your heart was pure. And you failed, Chloe. You failed miserably."
"No... no, please!" Chloe sobbed, her arrogance completely crumbling. "Mrs. Vance, I didn't know! I swear I didn't know! I was just stressed! Please, don't destroy my family!"
Evelyn Vance smiled, but there was no warmth in it.
"Cruelty isn't a mistake, child. It is a choice. Drive," she ordered the chauffeur.
The window rolled up, cutting off Chloe’s desperate pleas. The heavy engine roared to life, kicking up slush that splattered all over Chloe’s thousand-dollar coat as the limousine sped away into the night.
Inside the car, Liam looked at his mother. "Are you alright, Mom?"
Evelyn sighed, pulling off her worn knitted scarf to reveal a delicate platinum chain with a micro-drive dangling from it. "I’m fine, Liam. But your father’s brothers... they’ve moved faster than we thought. The incident on the street wasn't a coincidence. Chloe’s family wasn't just arrogant—they were planted in your life by your Uncle Marcus."
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Liam’s eyes narrowed. "Uncle Marcus? Chloe was working for him?"
"She didn't know it," Evelyn replied, gazing out at the passing city lights. "She was just a useful idiot. But her father’s company was being used to launder the money Marcus stole from our family's trust. Tonight was supposed to be the trap, Liam. They wanted you married into that family so they could lock you out of the board forever."
