The revelation of the 2010 contract hung heavy in the air, a silent bomb that had just detonated. Marcus, document still clenched in his hand, seemed to shrink under the weight of his own past choices. His earlier outrage felt hollow, stripped of its power.
Chloe LaRue, still standing alone at the altar, now moved. She descended the few steps, her white dress rustling like a furious whisper. She wasn’t looking at me, or the triplets. Her eyes were fixed on Marcus, blazing with a new kind of fire.
“Chloe, baby, it’s not what you think,” Marcus stammered, abandoning his attack on me. He took a hesitant step toward her, trying to recover some semblance of control.
“Isn’t it?” Chloe’s voice was sharp, cutting through the jazz music. “You just admitted on live television that you disavowed potential children for a house and a clean slate.”
She stopped a few feet from him, her posture rigid. Her gaze then flickered to Gerald Fontenot, who was still being formally served by Devon’s assistants near the exit. The scene of Gerald’s public humiliation played on a large screen near the stage, a convenient recap for anyone who missed it.
“And that subpoena,” Chloe said, her voice dropping, “it’s about the $14.5 million in missing royalties. Isn’t it, Marcus?”
Marcus’s eyes darted between Chloe and the screen showing Gerald. He knew she was smart, ambitious, and deeply invested in her career.
“My album advance,” Chloe continued, her voice gaining strength, tinged with a horrifying realization. “The $3 million advance for *Diamond Heart*. It was supposed to fund my entire tour, my video budget.”
She took a slow, deliberate step back from him. “You told me the label was facing ‘temporary cash flow issues.’ You said you ‘personally invested’ to cover the shortfall.”
A cold dread settled in my stomach. I looked at Devon. His expression was grim. He knew where this was going.
“You didn’t invest, did you, Marcus?” Chloe’s voice trembled, but with rage, not sorrow. “You diverted my advance. You used *my money* to pay off Gerald’s silence. To cover up your fraud.”
Marcus lunged forward, trying to grab her arm. “Chloe, please, don’t say anything more. Not here. Not now.”
She jerked away from him. “Don’t touch me! You used *my future* to hide your past!”
With a furious cry, Chloe LaRue pulled the sparkling diamond engagement ring from her finger. The light caught it as she flung it. It hit the polished glass floor of the ballroom with a sharp *clink*, skittering across the surface before coming to rest near a surprised wedding guest’s shoe.
“This wedding is off!” she declared, her voice echoing through the stunned silence that had fallen over the room. “I’m not marrying a thief and a liar!”
She turned on her heel, her white silk train sweeping across the floor. Without another word, she marched toward the exit, passing the bewildered security guards and Gerald Fontenot, who looked like he wanted the ground to swallow him whole.
The three national networks, still broadcasting live, had a field day. The cameras zoomed in on the abandoned ring, then on Marcus’s utterly devastated face. His grand wedding, meant to be his coronation, had imploded into a public divorce before the vows were even exchanged.
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