I opened my mouth bitterly to explain, but Daniel Brooks cut me off, his face full of disapproval toward me.
“Emma! If I hadn’t brought up cooperation, would anyone in the Carter family tolerate Chloe Miller? Even you speak to her however you please. If that’s the case, wouldn’t the rest of your family bully her to death?”
“I’m telling you, even after we’re married, Chloe will live with us. And after marriage, our assets will be divided with her—half.”
Seeing me freeze, Daniel softened his tone as if to comfort me.
“Emma, that wedding was nothing but a charade. I’d never let you marry anyone else. But you hurt Chloe, so this was just a lesson for you.”
“Now go prepare. Make the real wedding lively enough so Chloe won’t get bored.”
I looked at the man who once swore he’d love only me for life, and it felt like a thunderbolt splitting through me. My head rang hollow.
I had thought love was a story between two people. Turns out, not all love is.
I wanted to turn away with dignity, but my tears betrayed me, exposing my humiliation.
“Daniel, let’s call off the engagement.”
The man who was coaxing Chloe with cotton candy suddenly snapped his head up, staring at me in disbelief.
“What did you say?”
“Let’s end it.”
As those words left my lips, the suffocating pressure in my chest eased, and my expression steadied.
Daniel’s hand holding the candy stiffened for a moment, then relaxed. A mocking smile spread across his face.
“End the engagement? And what right do you have to say that? Does the Carter Group no longer want to survive?”
“And besides me, who else in the circle would dare marry you now? Emma, your reputation is already rotten beyond repair.”
“Or do you, the grand heiress of the Carter family, really intend to marry that crippled security guard?”
The calm I had found cracked into a stab of pain. So he knew—he knew everything his fiancée had suffered. Yet for the sake of venting Chloe’s anger, for the sake of forcing me and my family to accept his twisted bond with her, he had condoned it all.
Whatever affection we once shared evaporated into nothing.
The engagement ring on my finger suddenly felt unbearably heavy. In silence, I slid it off and held it out to him.
That diamond was one we had traveled to the source to choose together. Its design had come after a hundred failed sketches. We had even learned from a master jeweler for a year to set the stone ourselves.
He said a ring filled with such love would surely bind us until death, and he made me promise never to take it off.
But now, I no longer wanted it.
Daniel frowned, hesitating to accept it. When I didn’t withdraw my hand, irritation flashed in his eyes. He slapped the ring away.
I stared at him in shock, but he only sneered.
“If you don’t want it, then just throw it away.”
I let out a faint laugh of release, turned, and walked away.
“Yes, that’s better. It should have been this way all along.”
For a moment, Daniel’s expression froze. A trace of panic flickered across his face, and he reached out as if to stop me—but Chloe quickly clutched his arm, her voice soft and innocent.
“Daniel, Emma really seems upset. Did Chloe do something wrong?”
Daniel immediately turned to reassure her.
“It’s not your fault, Chloe. You’ve done nothing wrong. It’s the Carters who can’t accept you. In seven days, when their crisis deepens, she’ll come around on her own.”
Chloe’s eyes flickered with worry. “But isn’t that bad? What if it really breaks Emma’s heart?”
Daniel’s confidence was unshaken.
“No, never. Emma and I have loved each other for ten years. Something this small, I can smooth over after marriage. The real question is—don’t you want to live with me, Chloe?”
