Chapter 2
692 Parole
I swallowed the bitterness burning my throat and kept my voice steady.
“My brother needs money for surgery. And I need an identity… that makes it harder for people to crush me under their feet.”
He studied me for a long moment, then suddenly chuckled.
“You’re very honest.”
I lifted my head to look at him.
“What about you, Mr. Grant? Is this about love… or about need?”
“Love?” He seemed amused by the word. “I’m long past the age of believing love can fix anything.”
For a second, a thin wave of fear slid through me.
But I still nodded. “Then let’s each get what we need.”
I thought Adrian would find out much later.
But on the day of the wedding, he was already waiting at the church doors, eyes cold.
The moment I stepped out of the car, I heard his voice, laced with laughter:
“Congratulations, Miss Ivy.”
He walked toward me, one step at a time. His gaze traveled from my veil down to the bouquet clenched in my hands.
“You finally got everything you wanted.”
My fingers tightened around the flowers until my knuckles turned white, but I didn’t defend myself.
“You wouldn’t understand.”
My throat felt tight; my voice light and weightless, like it couldn’t find a place to land.
Adrian leaned in a little, his eyes filled with blatant contempt.
“What’s understand? You used a fake identity to get close to him, made sure you appeared at all the right events. How exactly are you different from those other women clinging to the money and power?”
I let the dimness in my eyes fade, looking at him through the blurry veil.
“And you, Adrian? From the first dance in that ballroom, you never took your eyes off me.”
He froze for a heartbeat, then sneered.
“That just means my taste was bad.”
The church bells began to ring. The officiant was already waiting inside, the bride’s spot still empty.
The city’s elite were whispering in their pews.
I had no time—and no way out.
“I should go in,” I said.
“Go ahead, Mrs. Grant.”
He bit out the title between his teeth. The calm mask on his face cracked, just a little.
“Remember to keep your performance convincing. Don’t disappoint him too quickly.”
The moment I stepped into the church, it felt like my heart was cut in half.
One half was for the future I was fighting for—
for my brother, for a life where I wouldn’t get stepped on so easily.
The other half was that stupid, reckless crush that had ignited under the chandeliers in a ballroom.
After the wedding, I really did become the joke on everyone’s lips—the so-called “stepmother” of the heir.
They laughed at me. Laughed at a nobody con artist suddenly landing in a position they wouldn’t dare dream of; laughed that I didn’t know the rules, that I didn’t deserve to be called “Grant.”
Downstairs, the staff whispered behind my back:
“She used to be some basic PR girl, right? Who knows if she was doing bottle service on the side.”
“I heard her degrees are all fake. Richard must really be getting old, to lose his head over a young woman like that.”
I walked past them with a coffee tray in my hands, as if I hadn’t heard a thing.
At night, the lights in the mansion went out one by one, until only the lamp in the study at the end of the hallway was still on.
Adrian often stood there, back to me, a glass of whiskey in his hand.
Once, I couldn’t help myself.
“If you keep drinking like that, your stomach’s going to give out,” I said.
He turned around and shot me a look full of contempt.
“This little bit of alcohol isn’t nearly enough to make me as stupid as my father.”
- Scrittore
