“And every Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday,” Bernice continued, “you’re not allowed to bother me. I’ll be spending time with Phineas… just talking with him.”
She said those conditions straight-faced, like she wasn’t tearing open her own dignity and tossing it on the floor.
It wasn’t the shamelessness that surprised me.
It was how boldly she aired it out, like she was proud to be someone’s kept woman.
Last time, she at least pretended to be cold and distant. She never dared flaunt her affair with Phineas in the open like this.
Now, she wasn’t hiding it at all.
Slowly, I smiled. ‘So,’ I figured out, ‘Bernice… You also came back to this life, huh?’
“Just buying a villa is enough to win me over completely. Oh, boy, you must be thrilled.”
“But don’t get ahead of yourself, though,” she added quickly, curling her lip. “Even if we marry, you don’t get to touch me. Not without my consent!”
Her words made me laugh.
‘Of course. That’s exactly how it was last time.’
I bent over backwards to please her, and what did it get me? A knife in the chest and a child that wasn’t mine.
The one time she actually touched me, I thought she was finally softening and letting her walls down.
Turns out, she was just pregnant—with Phineas’s kid. Bold of her to want me to raise their child.
I smirked and told her the truth about the marriage arrangement.
“Sorry to burst your bubble, Bernice, but you’re never going to be part of the Gainsboroughs.
“My family never forced any of you to stay.
“As long as you give up everything my family gave you, you can be with whoever you want. Why don’t you just give them up?”
She gave me a long, mocking look—top to bottom, like she was inspecting dirt under her nails.
“Oh, grow up. Here you are throwing a tantrum again.
“You still can’t accept the fact that you’re a useless nobody, can you?
“You think you can compete with Phineas? He’s the chauffeur’s son, sure—but he knows business. He’s got money. He’s got brains. He’ll be something. You?”
Her words almost made me laugh out loud.
Back then, I tanked my grades, my reputation, my future—just to chase her shadow through nightclubs and racing circuits.
Geraldine scolded me, warned me again and again. The night she cried for the first time in front of me—I still remember.
I skipped Bernice’s invite that night. One time. Just one.
And what happened? She went out alone. Got followed.
I dropped everything to find her. Took a knife for her. I bled for her.
But when I woke up, somehow, it was Phineas who had saved her. His father died heroically.
And from that day on, she funneled Gainsboroughs resources straight to Phineas.
He stole my homework. My projects. My awards.
And I let it happen. I didn’t dare make her mad.
But here’s the truth—Phineas could barely read a textbook. He was a fraud wearing my skin.
“So if he’s that great,” I said, voice low and steady, “why not go tell my grandfather you want to marry him?
“Or is it that you want to be Mrs. Gainsborough, but you can’t stomach being with me?”
For a second, she had no answer. Then she snorted twice, brushing it off.
“Oh, I get it. You’re trying to make me angry. Classic Cyril—throwing fits just to get my attention.
“Well, okay. I forgive you. I know it must sting—having to buy Phineas a villa. That must hurt your pride.
“But if I don’t see that villa within three days? Don’t even think about me showing up to the engagement announcement party.”
As she turned on her heel like a queen walking away from trash, I stared after her, my lips curling in contempt.
‘Delusional. Let her keep that smug confidence.’
She got one thing right—I am buying the villa.
But it’s not a gift.
It’s a trap.
That place will be laced with cameras.
‘And when the whole world sees the Gainsboroughs’s “expected bride” in bed with the chauffeur’s son?’
That’s when I’ll pull the trigger.
Public. Humiliating. Final.
I sent my most trusted man to take care of it.
The execution’s already in motion.
