Chapter 2 - The Fall of the Illusion
Ethan stood frozen in the middle of his opulent dining room, his mind spinning into total chaos. "No... no, this is a joke. Grace, tell them to stop! Tell them you're joking!"
Grace walked over to the table. She picked up the small ultrasound photograph that Alexander had placed back down. She held it close to her chest, her expression devoid of the warmth Ethan had taken for granted for five long years.
"Five years ago, Ethan, I sold my grandmother’s heirloom jewelry to keep your company afloat," Grace said quietly. "You never asked where the forty thousand dollars came from. You just assumed you were brilliant. I washed your clothes, I cooked your meals, I listened to you complain about business, and I loved you when you had nothing."
She looked at Lauren, who was now trembling behind Ethan, looking for an exit.
"And tonight," Grace continued, "on our fifth anniversary, when I was ready to tell you that you were going to be a father, you brought your mistress into our home and struck me."
"Grace, I... I didn't mean to hit you!" Ethan pleaded, taking a step toward her, his voice cracking with desperation. "I was stressed! Lauren manipulated me—she told me you were dragging me down, that I needed someone sophisticated for the Southgate project! Please, baby, look at me!"
"Don't touch her," Marcus growled, stepping directly between Ethan and Grace.
Lauren’s face flushed with fury as Ethan threw her under the bus. "Manipulated you?!" she shrieked at Ethan. "You lied to me! You told me your wife was an uneducated country girl with no family connections! You told me she was living off your money!"
"Shut up, Lauren!" Ethan shouted, turning on her with wild eyes. "Just get out! Get out of my house!"
"It isn't your house," Julian reminded him coolly, tapping his watch. "Seventeen minutes left, Ethan."
Grace turned her back on both of them. She looked at Alexander. "Alex, take me home. I don't want to stay here another minute."
"Your room at the estate has been ready since the day you married him, sweetheart," Alexander said softly, wrapping a long, heavy wool coat around Grace’s shoulders with delicate care.
As Marcus escorted Grace toward the front door, Ethan made a desperate move to follow her. "Grace! Grace, please! We can fix this! Think about our baby!"
Julian stepped into his path, placing a single, iron-hard hand on Ethan’s chest.
"If you ever come within a hundred yards of my sister or her child again, Ethan," Julian whispered, his voice smooth as silk and deadly as arsenic, "I won't just destroy your company. I will make sure you spend the rest of your life answering for every tax loop, every off-the-books payment, and every labor code violation you committed while trying to play real estate tycoon."
Ethan went pale. He had indeed cut corners on the Southgate project—at Lauren’s suggestion.
"And as for you, Miss Pierce," Julian added, turning his piercing gaze to Lauren. "Your father’s law firm relies heavily on corporate retainers from Montgomery subsidiaries. I suggest you call him before midnight. By tomorrow morning, his firm won't exist."
Lauren let out a high-pitched gasp and dropped her designer handbag onto the floor.
Grace stepped out into the cool night air, flanked by Alexander and Marcus. Waiting in the circular driveway was a fleet of three black Maybachs, their engines humming quietly in the Myers Park night.
As the car door was held open for her, Grace looked back one last time at the grand brick house. She saw Ethan through the floor-to-ceiling windows, falling to his knees on the rug, weeping as Lauren screamed at him.
Grace closed her eyes, placed her hand over her belly, and took a deep, clean breath.
May you like
"It's over," she whispered.
Alexander closed the door beside her and got into the front seat. "No, Grace," he said quietly as the driver pulled away into the darkness. "It's just beginning."
