All Chapters of VENGEANCE AS CRUEL AS HIS LOVE: Chapter 61 - Chapter 70

Jennifer’s POV The mansion felt unbearably quiet when I finally walked in, the kind of silence that didn’t soothe but pressed on my chest like a weight. Everyone scattered almost immediately: Happy dragging her feet toward the stairs, Croft rubbing a hand over his face as he disappeared into his study, and my mother lingering at the doorway as if unsure whether to sit or collapse.I carried my handbag to my bedroom, my legs heavy from the day’s emotions. The funeral haze still clung to me: faces, whispers, condolences, the weight of memory all circling like fog. I placed my bag on the dresser in my bedroom, exhaled shakily, and closed my eyes for just a moment.But something nagged at me.The letter.I hadn’t opened it at the cemetery. My mind had been too scattered, and Lucy had ruined the moment when I needed to see who gave it to me. I still remembered the glimpse: someone fully covered in black, face hidden, posture stiff, deliberate. A stranger. Or someone who didn’t want to b

CROFT POVFor the first time in weeks, the house felt quiet again. Not the heavy, suffocating silence of grief, but the gentle stillness of things slowly returning to order.Jennifer’s mother and her younger sister had left that morning. I watched their car disappear down the long driveway, relief and guilt twisting together in my chest. Their presence had been necessary, comforting even, but it had also kept the wound open. Now, the chaos had thinned. Doctors had stopped coming in and out. Condolence calls had reduced. The staff had resumed their normal rhythm.Everything was settling, except for Jennifer. That was the part I couldn’t understand. She had been so unpredictable these days, and most of the time, she kept things away from me and kept them only to herself. She moved through the mansion like a shadow: quiet, polite, and distant. She smiled when spoken to, answered when asked, but her warmth was gone. She stayed in her room longer than usual, avoided my eyes, and when we sa

Lucy POV Jennifer hadn’t returned my calls in days. That alone was enough to make my teeth grind.I paced the length of the living room, phone clenched in my palm, watching the screen fade to black again. No missed calls. No replies. No excuses left for her silence. Jennifer used to answer on the first ring, used to check on me, lean on me and need me. Now she barely existed in my world, as if I’d been erased from her life with the same care one wipes dust off a table.I hated it.Not because I missed her friendship no, that part had died long ago. But because distance meant danger. Jennifer withdrawing meant she was thinking. And when Jennifer thought too much, she started noticing patterns.I couldn’t allow that.“She thinks she’s smarter now,” I muttered, tossing the phone onto the couch. “Grief makes people bold.”I needed a way back in. A soft one. Something that didn’t look forced. Tears wouldn’t work anymore. Apologies would sound fake. Jennifer had always been easy to manipul

Jennifer POV I didn’t remember the drive home. I only knew my hands were shaking on the steering wheel, my chest tight, and my vision sharp with fury and pain. By the time I pulled into the mansion driveway, my heart was pounding so violently I thought it might burst through my ribs.I walked straight inside like a storm that had finally found land.Croft was in the living room.He looked up when he heard my steps, concern flickering across his face. “Jennifer?” he called gently. “You’re back early. Are you …”I didn’t let him finish. I crossed the space between us in seconds and grabbed the front of his shirt, fists clenched hard against his chest as tears poured freely down my face.“How could you?” I screamed, my voice breaking apart. “How could you cheat on me after everything we’ve been through?”His body stiffened under my grip.“What?” he asked, genuinely startled. “Jennifer, what are you talking about?”I shoved him back, my hands trembling now more from heartbreak than rage.

Stanley POVI woke up with a grin stretched across my face, stretching my arms like a predator about to feast.Today was the day, the culmination of months of patient scheming and careful positioning. Everything had been set, orchestrated to perfection, and now the final act would play out exactly the way I had envisioned. My heartbeat pulsed with excitement as I glanced at Lucy, who stood across the room, her eyes sharp, calculating, and suspicious. She thought she was in control, but little did she know, she had already fallen into the web I had spun for her.Lucy’s gaze lingered on me, piercing, wide, and cautious, as if she could read my every thought. I chuckled silently in my mind, shaking my head.Pathetic. She had always been too cautious, too naïve in her overconfidence. “Crap,” I whispered to myself, imagining the look of defeat I would see on her face once everything came crashing down. I knew her type well, someone who thought she could manipulate the situation, who belie