Someone grabbed the rooster and shoved it in my face.
"Don't you dare!"
"Hester Pruitt, if you humiliate me today, forget you—even Scott Delgado won't be able to handle the consequences!"
Hester swept her arm across the long display table, sending my dowry crashing to the floor. Porcelain shattered. Jade splintered. The sound cut through the hall like a scream.
I lunged forward and seized her wrist. "Stop!"
Those were antiques, every last piece irreplaceable. My parents had sent them specifically to give me standing at this wedding.
The moment Hester saw the panic on my face, she wrenched free and raked the remaining pieces off the table. They hit the marble in a cascade of breaking glass and splintering wood.
"No money, no power, and all you can scrape together for a dowry is this junk?" She curled her lip. "You think you can intimidate me?"
"Finish the ceremony, or I'll have someone finish it for you!"
On her signal, two men grabbed the wine glass—the one the rooster had already drunk from—and forced it toward my mouth.
I shoved them back with everything I had, trembling with a rage I could barely contain.
I had grown up inside a classified government research facility. Never in my life had anyone subjected me to this kind of degradation.
Enough was enough. I raised my hand, ready to slap Hester across the face.
A voice roared from behind me.
"Touch her and see what happens!"
My fingers curled into a fist. I stopped myself. Barely.
Scott glared at me, then strode past without a second glance. He went straight to Hester, who was clutching her wrist with a wounded expression. He cradled her hand in both of his, brow furrowed, voice impossibly gentle.
"Hester, are you okay?"
Her eyes turned red on cue. She pointed at me, voice quivering with rehearsed distress.
"Mr. Delgado, she bullied me! She tried to hit me—look, she hurt my wrist!"
I stood rooted to the spot. Something inside my chest sank, slow and heavy.
He hadn't come for me.
Scott turned his head. The look he gave me held no trace of guilt. Only undisguised contempt.
"Elise, who the hell gave you permission to lay a hand on Hester?"
Scott Delgado was handsome—strikingly so—and undeniably capable. But he was blind. Completely, willfully blind.
Watching him lash out without bothering to ask a single question, the fury inside me became impossible to swallow.
I tore the red cord from my wrist and threw it down.
"She's the one who destroyed my dowry. She's the one who humiliated me. And you two have the nerve to turn this around on me?"
"Scott, in case you've forgotten—you are my fiancé. She is your secretary."
Scott looked at me as if I'd told a joke. A cold, mirthless smile twisted his mouth.
"Fiancé?"
"Elise, you must have done your homework by now. You know exactly who I am. And you know exactly who you are." His voice turned to ice. "Do you honestly think you deserve to marry me?"
"Clinging to some dusty old favor between our parents and thinking that's enough to climb your way into the Delgado family? Keep dreaming."
The guests, emboldened now that Scott had said it outright, let their whispers swell into open mockery.
"Scott Delgado runs this city. Even if he didn't marry into old money, he'd marry for love. Who does she think she is? If she doesn't own a mirror, she can always check her reflection in a puddle."
"Trash belongs in the gutter. Try to perch on a higher branch and you won't even know what killed you when you fall."
Before I could get a word out, Scott shot me one last scornful look, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a diamond ring. The stone was enormous—the size of a pigeon's egg, catching the light like a small sun.
He dropped to one knee in front of Hester.
The entire hall erupted.
Hester pressed both hands over her mouth, tears brimming, the picture of overwhelmed gratitude.
Scott slid the ring onto her finger. His voice was tender and deliberate, carrying to every corner of the room.
"Hester, I'm sorry I put you through this."
"This wedding was nothing but a farce my father forced on me. You're the one I love. You've always been the one."
"Marry me. I'll give you everything you've ever wanted. No one will ever make you suffer again."
Hester's face glowed with triumph. She cast a slow, deliberate glance in my direction, then admired the ring on her finger, her voice dripping with sweetness.
"Thank you, Scott. You're so good to me."
I stood there, frozen to the bone. My nails bit into my palms until I felt the skin break.
