Chapter 3 - The Exposed Foundation
“When the truth speaks, the money stops talking.”“...Ava believes what she wants to believe because she’s lonely,” Nathaniel’s booming voice echoed through the ballroom, amplified by thirty-two high-fidelity speakers. “She thinks I looked at her across that crowded gallery because of fate. I looked at her because she was the key to a hundred-billion-dollar energy monopoly...”
The collective gasp from seven hundred high-society guests was a physical force. It sucked the air right out of the room.
Nathaniel’s face drained of color so fast it looked as if he had been struck by lightning. His eyes widened, his gaze darting from Ava to the speakers, then to his legal team in the front row.
“Once the ring is on and the papers are signed, she becomes a quiet, well-compensated housewife... By the time she realizes she’s living in a golden cage, I’ll own the ground her father is buried under.”
“Shut it off!” Julian Vance roared, sprinting toward the audio booth. “Shut it off now!”
But it was too late. The audio technician, terrified and confused, accidentally froze the system, causing the most damning sentence to loop twice over the main speakers: “...own the ground her father is buried under... own the ground her father is buried under...”
The media cameras, brought in to capture a fairytale wedding for the New York Times and Vogue, pivoted instantly from the altar to the crowd, capturing the panicked, furious expressions of the West family. The live-stream chat, viewed by three million people globally, exploded into a frenzy of viral shares.
Inside the ballroom, chaos erupted.
“Nathaniel, what is the meaning of this?” his mother, the formidable Eleanor West, demanded, rising from her seat with her pearls trembling.
Nathaniel ignored his mother. He stepped toward Ava, his face morphing from shock into a dark, vicious mask of rage. The mask had slipped entirely. The charming prince was gone; the predatory wolf was exposed.
“You bitch,” he hissed under his breath, his voice low so the microphones wouldn't catch it, though his eyes looked ready to kill. “Do you have any idea what you’ve just done? You’ve destroyed your own life. You have nothing without me. You sign those papers or I will ensure you spend the rest of your days in a federal prison for defamation and extortion.”
Ava didn't flinch. She took a step closer to him, looking down at the platinum ring still clutched in his trembling fingers.
“I didn't defame you, Nathaniel. You defamed yourself,” Ava said, her voice dropping to a deadly, calm whisper. “And as for the papers... I’m not signing your pre-nup. But you see, we just said 'I do' in front of an archbishop and seven hundred witnesses. By New York state common law and the explicit terms of the public marriage registry we signed in the back room twenty minutes ago... we are technically, legally married.”
Nathaniel froze.
“But the ceremony isn't finished,” he whispered, a sudden spike of panic piercing through his anger.
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Ava looked at the archbishop, who was holding his cross as if shielding himself from a demon. Then she looked back at Nathaniel.
“It is finished for me,” Ava said. She reached up, tore the cathedral veil from her auburn hair, and let it drop to the marble floor. “I’ll see you in divorce court, husband. I’m taking half of everything—including the lithium.”
