Chapter 4 - The Engagement Gala Ambush
Three days later, the high-society columns of New York were buzzing with a single topic: the Prescott-Hayes Engagement Gala.
Meredith Hayes had moved heaven and earth to push the event forward. She had booked the grand ballroom at the St. Regis, invited every blue-blood family from Manhattan to the Hamptons, and spent money she clearly didn't have to announce Ethan Prescott’s engagement to Chloe.
It was a desperate power move. Ethan needed to project absolute financial stability to his underworld creditors, and my mother needed to solidify the public narrative that Chloe was the golden child, while Scarlet had mysteriously "retreated from public life due to health concerns."
They had deliberately withheld an invitation from me.
I stood in front of the full-length mirror in the master suite of Lorenzo’s penthouse, adjusting the strap of an emerald-green silk gown that clung to every curve of my body like liquid fire. The back was cut impossibly low, revealing the pale expanse of my spine, and around my neck hung a necklace of flawless diamonds and Colombian emeralds from the private Moretti vault.
I looked like a queen dressed for war.
A knock sounded, and the heavy oak door opened. Lorenzo stepped inside, dressed in a custom black tuxedo that made him look like an archangel of death. His gaze swept over me, from the emeralds at my throat down to the slit in my gown, his pupils dilating with an intensity that made the room feel suddenly smaller.
“You look breathtaking,” he said, his voice husky.
“I look like someone who isn't going to a sanitarium,” I replied, managing a cold smile.
He walked over, pulling a black velvet box from his pocket. He flipped it open. Inside rested a pear-cut, ten-carat flawless pink diamond, set in platinum, surrounded by a halo of micro-pave stones. It caught the light, throwing prismatic fractures across the ceiling.
“Your sister is wearing a two-carat stone that belonged to your grandmother,” Lorenzo said, lifting the massive ring from the velvet. “Let’s show the room what an actual empire looks like.”
He took my left hand and slid the ring onto my finger. It was heavy, cool, and a statement of sheer, overwhelming dominance.
“Are you ready for this, Scarlet?” he asked softly, searching my eyes. “Once we step through those doors tonight, there is no turning back. Ethan will know his scheme is dead. And when a man like that realizes he has lost, he gets reckless.”
“Let him get reckless,” I said, resting my palm against the lapel of his tuxedo, feeling the steady, rhythmic beat of his heart. “I spent years being quiet so Ethan could feel large. I want him to choke on how small he really is.”
Lorenzo smiled—a slow, dangerous flash of teeth—and offered his arm. “After you, future Mrs. Moretti.”
The grand ballroom of the St. Regis was a glittering sea of crystal chandeliers, white orchids, and champagne flutes. Two hundred of the city’s most influential socialites, investors, and politicians were mingling, laughing, and toasting the "happy couple."
On the raised platform at the far end of the room stood Ethan and Chloe, flanked by my mother. Meredith looked triumphant in royal blue, holding court with several elderly matriarchs who controlled the city’s charity boards. Ethan looked polished, but the frantic, watchful tension in his shoulders was unmistakable. He kept checking his phone every two minutes, scanning the entrance like a man waiting for an executioner.
He was right to wait.
The double doors of the ballroom swung open.
The brass fanfare didn't sound, but the change in the room was instant. A hush rippled from the foyer across the marble floor, traveling like an invisible shockwave through the crowd.
Lorenzo and I stepped inside.
I walked with my head held high, my hand resting effortlessly in the crook of Lorenzo’s arm. The emerald silk hissed softly against the floor. Beside me, Lorenzo radiated an aura of lethal supremacy that silenced the chatter within seconds. The private security guards hired for the event immediately straightened, eyes darting to the floor, recognizing a man whose authority superseded any badge or private detail in the state.
Whispers erupted like wildfire.
*“Is that Scarlet Hayes?”*
*“With Lorenzo Moretti? Good God, is that the Moretti emerald necklace?”*
*“I thought Meredith said Scarlet was recovering from a nervous collapse in upstate?”*
*“Look at her hand... is that a pink diamond?”*
Up on the platform, Meredith’s champagne glass shattered on the floor.
The sound of breaking crystal was loud enough to puncture the stunned silence. Chloe gasped, dropping her bouquet of white roses.
And Ethan? Ethan looked as if he were having a stroke. The wine in his glass sloshed over his white cuff as he gripped the stem with knuckles that had turned dead white.
Lorenzo guided me through the parting crowd. Guests moved out of our path like water before the prow of a battleship. We didn't stop until we reached the foot of the raised platform.
“Good evening, Mother,” I said, my voice carrying clearly through the silent room. “Chloe. Ethan. I apologize for not RSVP’ing, but the invitation seemed to have been lost in the mail. Luckily, Lorenzo insisted we drop by to offer our congratulations.”
Meredith took a step forward, her face cycling through pale white, furious red, and sickly gray. “Scarlet... what is the meaning of this? You are causing a scene at your sister’s event!”
“A scene?” Lorenzo interjected, his dark eyes cutting toward my mother with the precision of a scalpel. “A loving sister coming to celebrate an engagement is hardly a scene, Mrs. Hayes. Unless, of course, there is something about this sudden union you find... shameful?”
The crowd leaned in, hungrily feeding on the high-society blood in the water. Several prominent socialites exchanged malicious grins behind their champagne flutes.
Chloe started crying, her mascara running down her cheeks. “Scarlet, please... you’re ruining everything! Tonight was supposed to be mine!”
“You took my fiancé, Chloe,” I said, looking her dead in the eye, keeping my voice level and icy. “You took the ring off my vanity. You took my bed. You can have him. I’m simply here to make an announcement of my own.”
Lorenzo stepped up beside me, wrapping a possessive arm around my waist, pulling me firmly against his side. He lifted my left hand, displaying the blinding ten-carat pink diamond to every camera and socialite in the room.
“Scarlet has agreed to become my wife,” Lorenzo announced, his voice carrying an unmistakable ring of absolute authority. “The Moretti and Hayes families will be merging our assets next month. In celebration, Moretti Holdings has just initiated a full forensic audit of all joint Hayes-Prescott accounts to ensure our bride’s legacy is thoroughly protected.”
Ethan let out a strangled gasp. He lunged forward, grabbing the brass rail of the stage. “You can’t do that! You have no legal standing to audit Prescott accounts!”
“I have every standing, Prescott,” Lorenzo said, his voice dropping into a deadly, private frequency that only Ethan and those near the platform could hear. “Because three hours ago, I purchased seventy percent of your firm’s senior secured debt from your creditors in Miami. I am not just your auditor, Ethan. I am your owner. And on Monday morning, I am calling your loans due.”
Ethan swayed on his feet, his hands trembling violently. The reality of his complete financial annihilation hit him with the force of a freight train. He looked at Chloe, then at Meredith, realizing that the family he had betrayed me to conquer was now a burning ship sinking beneath his feet.
Before anyone could say another word, Chloe sobbed and ran off the stage toward the private suites. Meredith scrambled after her, leaving Ethan standing entirely alone on the raised platform, exposed, ruined, and visibly trembling under the harsh glare of the ballroom chandeliers.
Lorenzo turned to me, offering a wicked, brilliant smirk.
“Shall we have that dance now, darling?” he asked.
May you like
I smiled, taking his hand as the orchestra awkwardly began to play. “I’d love to, Lorenzo. The evening is just getting started.”
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