Chapter 3 - THE EMPTY MANSION
The drive back to the estate was silent,
Alexander stared out the window,
His mind racing,
He couldn't believe he had almost married her,
He had been so blind,
So caught up in the image of her,
The grace,
The beauty,
The perceived charm,
It was all a mask,
A performance designed to ensnare him,
He arrived at the mansion,
It was quiet,
Too quiet,
The staff had heard the news,
They were huddled in the kitchen,
Whispering,
He walked through the grand hallway,
It felt like a museum of a life he no longer recognized,
He went into his study,
He poured himself a glass of whiskey,
He needed the burn,
He needed the numbness,
His phone was buzzing incessantly,
Reporters,
Investors,
Family members,
He turned it off,
He didn't want to hear the justifications,
He didn't want to hear the pleas,
He looked at the desk,
There was a stack of wedding invitations,
Hundreds of them,
Unsent,
Or rather,
Sent and now rendered meaningless,
He walked to the window,
He looked out at the garden,
The marquee for the reception was still standing,
Workers were already taking it down,
It looked like a ghost of a party that never happened,
He thought about Mia,
The little girl who had saved him,
She was young,
But she had more courage than all the adults in that room combined,
He felt a strange gratitude toward her,
He wondered if she knew the magnitude of what she had done,
She had saved him from a lifetime of misery,
A lifetime of living with a woman who played games with human hearts,
He sat at his desk,
He opened his laptop,
He needed to see it again,
The video,
He played it,
The moment Elena hid the necklace,
The smirk on her face,
It was chilling,
It was predatory,
He paused the video,
He zoomed in on her eyes,
There was no remorse,
Only calculation,
He closed the laptop,
He couldn't watch it anymore,
The reality was too painful,
Too vivid,
He wondered about the necklace,
It was an heirloom,
His grandmother's,
Elena had begged for it,
She had claimed it was the only piece that would make her look like a queen,
Now he realized,
It was just another pawn in her game,
She wanted to see if she could frame Sarah,
She wanted to test her power,
To see if she could manipulate the room,
And she had failed,
Because truth,
No matter how small,
Has a way of finding the light,
He took another sip of his whiskey,
He looked at the safe in the corner,
He walked over to it,
He dialed the combination,
He opened the heavy steel door,
Inside,
There were documents,
Papers,
Contracts,
He started to sift through them,
If she was capable of this,
What else was she capable of?
He began to look at the financial records,
The expenses,
The invoices,
He needed to know,
He needed to see if there were other betrayals,
Other lies,
Hidden in the fine print of their life together,
He felt like an explorer in a dark, unfamiliar land,
And the deeper he went,
The more he suspected,
May you like
That the woman he thought he knew,
Had never existed at all.
