Chapter 2 - The Mother’s Wrath
Eleanor Montgomery didn't wait for the murmur to settle. Like a furious black swan, she swept down the grand staircase from the balcony, her heavy silk skirts rustling with lethal intent. She bypassed the wedding arch entirely, marching straight down the central aisle, her face a mask of aristocratic fury.
"Security!" Eleanor’s voice was a chilling, perfectly modulated hiss that could cut glass. "Remove this trash from my property immediately. Throw them out before I have every guard on this estate prosecuted for trespassing!"
Two massive private security guards in tailored suits instantly stepped forward, moving with practiced menace toward where my sons stood.
Liam instinctively stepped to the left, Noah to the right, and Caleb planted himself squarely in front of me, his small hands balled into tiny fists. "Don't you touch our mama!" Caleb shouted, his young voice ringing out with a fierce, unmistakable Montgomery authority.
The guards froze. They looked at Eleanor, then down at the boys, and hesitation flickered across their trained faces. You don't touch children who look identical to the sole heir of the estate—especially when their legal status is suddenly terrifyingly ambiguous.
"Touch them," I whispered, stepping forward until I was mere inches from Eleanor’s powdered face, "and I will have my corporate legal team file an emergency injunction freezing every single asset, bank account, and trust fund the Montgomery family owns before the sun sets."
Eleanor stopped dead. Her eyes narrowed into venomous slits. "You poor, delusional creature," she spat, her voice shaking with rage. "You think you can show up here with a trio of illegitimate street urchins and shake the foundations of a dynasty? Ethan divorced you. You took a pitiful severance and vanished like a coward. These boys mean nothing. They have no legal claim to anything!"
I smiled, slow and predatory. "Are you sure about that, Eleanor? Check your family registry. Check the birth certificates filed in downtown Chicago five years ago. And more importantly... check who currently owns thirty-four percent of Montgomery Logistics."
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Eleanor stumbled back a half-step. The color vanished from her face completely. "That's... that's impossible. No outside entity could buy that stake. It was locked in a trust!"
"A trust that went bankrupt during your little supply chain crisis last year," I replied smoothly, adjusting the lapel of Liam’s jacket. "I bought the debt pennies on the dollar through my agency. I didn't come here today to beg for scraps, Eleanor. I came to take my seat."
