Chapt 5. She Accepts Her Fate

She had once used her family’s name like a weapon, mocking others with careless words because the Carters were large, influential, untouchable. Now the wheel had turned — and Charlotte Sinclair, who had once delighted in cutting others down, was not about to let this opportunity pass.

Charlotte’s smile widened as she hooked her arm through Adrian Harrington’s. She leaned close, coquettish, voice syrupy. “Honey, look who it is. Isabella Carter, no less. We used to be such good friends—how could you leave without saying goodbye? This calls for a proper reunion.”

Adrian didn’t reply. His gaze merely skimmed over Charlotte and fell toward the woman standing at the doorway. He said nothing, but his silence spoke a verdict Isabella already understood: she was trapped. This was exactly what Dominic Lancaster wanted. Sending her here had never been about forgiveness — it was spectacle. He wanted the city to humiliate her, to have everyone line up from south to north to watch her fall.

She had expected it. People like Charlotte would queue up to gloat; if not Charlotte, there would be others—Lillian, Zoe, Gina—each with a tooth to bare, each waiting to tear at a wound that would never fully close. The knowledge settled in Isabella’s chest like cold stone.

She bowed her head and rubbed the corner of her mouth where the skin felt tight. “Please,” she murmured to Amy beside her, “tell the manager there’s a guest who needs me. Don’t let them mark me absent.”

Amy’s eyes flicked sympathetically toward Charlotte, then away. She wasn’t stupid; she’d seen the way Charlotte glared at Isabella. But Amy had her own secrets — rumors had a way of eating people alive here. Better to keep them from the surface. She nodded once, small and uncertain. “I’ll tell her,” she whispered.

Isabella followed Charlotte and Adrian through the club, meek as a shadow. Her movements were careful, deliberate — the motion of someone who had learned to make herself small. She rode the elevator with them and was ushered into a private VIP room where the smell of liquor saturated the air.

Lights came up at Charlotte’s touch, turning the room from a murky glow into bright, clinical clarity. The effect was immediate: every flaw, every scar, every tremor in Isabella’s hands became visible, exposed to their amusement.

A voice slurred from the far side of the room. “Adrian! At last. We’ve wasted away without you. You must punish yourself for being late. And someone bring the newcomer a drink.” Laughter bubbled around the table like a contaminate.

Charlotte made a show of presenting Isabella, dragging her to the center of the room like a prize. “Everyone, look who it is. The Carter heiress herself. Isn’t it delightful?”

At the sight, the room erupted. Jokes, jeers, the clink of glasses. Eyes that had never known hardship ranged over her like a searing inspection. Some were curious, some cruel. When one of the men leapt to his feet and shouted, “Holy—Isn’t that Isabella Carter? The one who tried to hurt Sophia Harrington? No way—it’s actually her,” the sound hit the room like an explosion.

Charlotte elbowed Isabella mockingly. “Go on. Say hello. Don’t be shy.” Her smile was vicious.

Isabella’s palms sweated against the fabric of her dress. Yet when she opened her mouth, it was with the same soft, measured voice she’d used all morning. “I’m Isabella,” she said.

Adrian’s expression deepened; a flicker of something — concern, perhaps, or memory — crossed his features. He didn’t rise to the bait. Instead, he watched her with a look that was impossible to read. In the neon buzz beyond the window, the city glittered and ignored them all.

Back at the office, Secretary Lee hovered by the door, uneasy. He cast a careful glance at Dominic Lancaster, who lounged in his leather chair like a king on a throne. Dominic’s grey suit fit him like armor; the black lighter he toyed with flashed in the lamplight, his ring glinting with predatory brilliance.

He asked lightly, “Is Adrian there?”

“Yes,” Lee answered.

Dominic flicked open the lighter with a soft ding. He drew in a cigarette, the ember bright against his fingertips. “Let them play,” he said, words cool as the smoke curling from his mouth. “Tell Miranda not to intervene.”

A small, almost imperceptible smile crossed his face as he imagined the scene unfolding. Two years had passed — surely the harshness of prison had bent her, had softened the girl who used to carry herself like an heiress and a princess. But Dominic did not believe transformation could be so tidy. Not in the space of a couple of winters. He wanted proof. Redemption, he thought, was rarely sincere. He wanted to see whether Isabella’s soul had been rewritten — or whether the old arrogance lingered, waiting to be exposed.

Outside, the night stretched on, and the cigarette burned down slowly between his fingers.

Isabella lost count of the number of drinks she was forced to drink. Each tasted of spirit and humiliation, warmth spreading that felt less like comfort and more like a slow erasure. She sipped because refusal would mark her as difficult; she drank because the club demanded it. Glass after glass, her head grew light; her stomach churned like a furnace set to burn. She could feel the world narrowing to the sweep of the room, the circle of faces that watched with morbid delight.

She understood that begging would be useless. Here, there was no mercy to be found. The men and women gathered around the table were not interested in the truth of what had happened two years ago. They were only eager for the story — the gossip — the thrill of seeing the fallen heiress up close. Her protests, her pleas, even the truth of her own suffering, would be swallowed by their appetite for spectacle.

Charlotte’s voice cut through the haze, sharp and dark. “So, Isabella,” she said, cup poised for another toast. “Tell us — how’s prison? Was it as glamorous as people say?” Laughter rippled around the table, cruel and immediate.

Isabella forced a smile. The muscles in her face ached. “It was a long time,” she said, voice small. “I learned a lot.”

“Good,” Charlotte purred. “We’ll toast to your lesson, then.” She raised her glass. The others followed like a flock, eyes bright with accusation under the pretense of celebration.

Isabella clinked the glass, the sound like a small, brittle bell. She drank. The liquor burned; then darkness licked at the edges of her vision. She swallowed hard, steadying herself on the table, handing the glass back like a guilty penitent.

She could not cry. Not here, not in a room full of faces that wanted to watch her break. She flattened the tremor in her hands and let another forced smile ride across her lips. If she had to be the butt of their jokes, she would do it without flair. If she had to be small to keep her family safe, she would shrink.

Because survival, she had learned, was not a matter of dignity. It was endurance. And in this moment, with the club’s lights glaring and Dominic’s unseen approval like a noose around her neck, she accepted that fate.

Outside, the city kept its indifferent hum — and inside, glasses rose, clinking again, sealing the night.