Chapter 3 - The Ring on My Finger and the Shattered Toast
Daniel smiled—a slow, dangerous curve of his lips that signaled complete ruin for everyone who had laughed on that terrace.
He took my left hand in his. With a slow, deliberate movement that four hundred elite guests watched in breathless silence, he slid a fifteen-carat, flawless black cushion-cut diamond ring onto my ring finger.
Then, before the entire Montgomery family, Daniel Reyes dropped to one knee, pressed his lips to the knuckles of my left hand, rose to his full height, and pulled me into an uncompromising, breathless kiss right in the center of the ballroom floor.
Allison let out a choked shriek from the stage. “What is happening?! Why is he kissing Meredith?!”
Victor rushed forward, his face turning an alarming shade of mottled purple. “Meredith! What kind of sick, desperate trick are you playing?! Mr. Reyes, I apologize for my daughter! She’s mentally unstable, she’s been lashing out all evening because she’s jealous of Allison’s marriage! She probably hired an impersonator or—”
“Victor Montgomery,” Daniel said, his voice cutting through Victor’s hysteria like a diamond blade. “If you speak to my wife in that tone one more time, I will ensure that by midnight tonight, you do not own the shoes on your feet.”
Wife.
The word exploded inside the ballroom like a concussion grenade.
Evelyn Montgomery, my mother, dropped her crystal clutch to the floor. The emeralds on her necklace trembled violently against her throat. “W-Wife? Meredith... is married?”
“We were legally wed three years ago at the United States Consulate in Zurich,” Daniel announced, his arm resting securely around my waist. “Meredith requested that our marriage remain private while she built her autonomous logistics firm without the influence of the Reyes name. She wanted her achievements to stand on their own merit.”
May you like
Daniel turned his gaze onto Allison and Preston, who looked as though they had been struck by lightning.
“My wife spent thirty-two years protecting your feelings,” Daniel continued, each syllable dripping with venomous disdain. “She allowed you to call her poor, single, and abrasive because she didn’t want to humiliate you with the reality of her life. But when you decided to shove the woman I love into a freezing fountain for the amusement of your socialite sycophants, you forfeited every right to my mercy.”
