Chapter 13 - The Vengeful Ex-FiancéeBefore I could ask who she was, heavy boots crunched on the snow outside the cabin deck.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The front door shook under a violent, impatient barrage of knocks. Marcus moved instantly, stepping protectively in front of me and placing the tablet down.
“Stay here with Annie,” Marcus commanded quietly, his voice like iron.
He strode to the heavy oak door and pulled it open.
Standing on the porch, framed by swirling snowflakes, was a woman who looked like she had just stepped off a high-fashion runway in Milan. She wore an expensive white fur coat, sunglasses pushed up over her immaculate blonde hair, and a smirk that dripped pure venom.
“Hello, Marcus,” she purred, brushing past him uninvited into the warm cabin like she owned the place. “Did you really think you could elope in secret and I wouldn’t find out?”
I stepped out from the hallway, holding Annie tightly. “Who are you?”
The woman turned, her icy blue eyes scanning me up and down with open, vicious disgust. She sneered, letting out a sharp, mocking laugh.
“So this is the discount single mother you traded a multi-billion-dollar corporate alliance for,” she hissed. “Classy, Marcus. Really classy.”
“Watch your tone, Victoria,” Marcus warned, his voice dropping into a register so cold and lethal it made the air in the room freeze. He stepped between us, shielding me completely. “You broke the restraining order by coming here. Vance!”
From the doorway, two security guards who had been stationed outside stepped into the room instantly.
Victoria didn’t flinch. She simply smiled, pulling a sleek tablet of her own from her designer handbag.
“Go ahead, call your goons, Marcus,” Victoria laughed, waving her tablet casually. “But before you throw me out, you might want to look at what I’m leaking to the global press in exactly three minutes. You see, I funded your lovely ex-husband’s legal campaign, yes. But more importantly... I bought out the remaining debt on Emily’s struggling family business in Cedar Falls. If you don't sign over fifty percent of Whitmore Technologies' voting shares back to me right now... I foreclose on her parents' old farm, bankrupt her entire hometown, and ruin her good name forever.”
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My breath caught. My hometown. My parents' legacy.
Victoria had weaponized my entire past against us.
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