Chapter 6

My father probably thought I was just being willful.

He had no idea I'd already set the trap.

On Friday night, the Ashbourne family held a charity gala at a hotel in London.

It was one of the social events my father cared about most. Aristocrats, financiers, and reporters packed the ballroom, and he was working the room with Lydia and Claire in tow, chatting with guests as if nothing were wrong.

Adrian kept glancing at the ballroom doors.

Because I still hadn't shown up.

Then, just as the gala officially began, the lights in the ballroom suddenly went dim.

The charity's promotional video vanished from the big screen onstage. In its place, financial statements and bank records appeared one after another.

The whole room erupted.

"Oh my God, what is that? Records from a secret Swiss bank account?"

"Look at those amounts! Five million pounds... eight million pounds! All of it went into the account of a woman named Lydia Bennett!"

"Lydia? Isn't that the woman who's been on the Duke's arm all night?"

The evidence kept coming.

The deed to a mansion, receipts for luxury goods, and invoice after invoice for jewelry flashed across the screen. Every single item had been paid for with money from my late mother's private trust.

The last thing on the screen was a forged agreement that my father had signed himself.

Part of the money he'd taken had gone toward what he owed his golf club. Another chunk had gone to cover his gambling debts.

The reporters swung their cameras toward my father.

From outside the ballroom, I watched on the security feed as the color slowly drained from his face.

The champagne glass slipped from his hand and shattered on the floor.

"Shut off that screen! Where the hell is security?!"

I pushed open the ballroom doors.

"No need to shout, Your Grace."

Every head in the room turned toward me.

Wearing that same red dress, with my lawyer and an auditor beside me, I walked in, went straight onto the stage, and picked up the microphone.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I'm sorry to interrupt tonight's gala."

I looked out over the guests and their mixed reactions, and finally let my eyes settle on my father.

"But as the legal heir to the Ashbourne Trust, it's my responsibility to set the record straight on something."

"Every charitable donation Granville Ashbourne has announced publicly over the past five years actually came from money he illegally siphoned from his late wife's estate."

The murmurs in the crowd grew louder.

I didn't stop.

"On top of that, he used the money to buy a mansion and jewelry for his lover, and he has been trying to move the Ashbourne family's core assets into his illegitimate daughter's name."

"You ungrateful child! That's slander!"

My father roared at me, beside himself with rage, but all the evidence was right there on the screen for everyone to see.

The reporters swarmed him and boxed him in until he couldn't move.

"Your Grace! Did you really use your late wife's estate to cover your gambling debts?"

"Is Claire Bennett your illegitimate daughter?"

"Have you been using trust money to keep your lover all this time?"

Camera flashes went off nonstop.

Claire and Lydia could only hide their faces as security hustled them out in disgrace.

Adrian, though, shoved his way through the crowd, reached me, and grabbed my arm.

"Are you insane? The Ashbourne name is finished, and you're dragging the Devaux family down with it! What about our wedding?"

I pulled my arm free and calmly smoothed the sleeve he'd crumpled.

"Don't worry."

I looked at him and smiled.

"There's another surprise waiting for you at the wedding."

I turned and walked out of the ballroom without looking back at him.

But I knew that from that moment on, Adrian's luck was running out.