Chapter 9 - Adrian’s Fury
Adrian slowly let go of my hands, stepped down from the altar platform, and walked with measured, heavy strides down the center aisle toward the third row where his mother stood trembling.
The entire chapel watched in breathless silence. No one dared to move a muscle.
When Adrian reached his mother, he stopped just inches away, towering over her with an expression carved from absolute ice.
“For the past six months,” Adrian spoke, his voice dangerously low, steady, and echoing through the chapel’s sound system, “I trusted you to help me manage my father’s legacy while he lay paralyzed in a hospital bed. I believed your criticisms of Claire were just old-fashioned snobbery. I never, in a million years, imagined that the woman who raised me was a criminal.”
“Adrian, please... let me explain in private—” Evelyn stammered, raising a shaking hand toward his face.
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“Don't you dare touch me,” Adrian hissed, swatting her hand away with a sharp, violent motion. “The wedding is cancelled. Our familial relationship is permanently terminated. And as of tomorrow morning, my legal team will file criminal charges against you for corporate embezzlement, fraud, and malicious property destruction.”
Evelyn let out a choked gasp, her knees buckling beneath her. She grabbed onto the wooden pew for support as the crushing reality of her complete and total defeat settled over her.
