The champagne glass shattered against the marble floor, but no one heard it over the gasps.
I stood frozen in my white engagement dress custom Valentino, twenty thousand dollars of silk and lace that now felt like a shroud as my fiancé Nathan's voice boomed through the microphone.
The crystal chandeliers above the Plaza Hotel's Grand Ballroom cast glittering light across three hundred shocked faces, all turned toward the stage where my entire life was crumbling in real-time.
"I have an announcement to make," Nathan said, his voice steady, practiced. His arm wrapped around my step-sister Elena's waist, pulling her close against his side. Her red dress Versace, I noted with bitter clarity clung to her body like a second skin. And her hand… her hand rested protectively on her stomach. A small, visible bump that hadn't been there last month.
No. No, no, no.
My mind raced, calculating dates, remembering moments. The business trips Nathan had taken. The times Elena had "coincidentally" been in the same cities. The way they'd barely looked at each other at family dinners, as if practiced indifference could hide the truth.
How long? How long had I been the fool?
"Elena and I are expecting a baby," Nathan continued, and his smile God, that smile I'd once thought was meant only for me was wide and shameless. Triumphant, even.
"And I've realized over these past months that she's the one I truly love. Not Aria."
The ballroom erupted. Whispers became gasps became scandalized conversations that rose in volume like a symphony of my humiliation. I could pick out individual voices in the chaos:
"Did you know?"
"Poor thing, she looks devastated"
"I heard the Chen family company just merged with the Cross portfolio"
"This is better than reality TV"
My best friend Jennifer pushed through the crowd toward me, her face pale with shock, but I held up a hand to stop her. I couldn't bear anyone's pity right now. Couldn't afford to break in front of these vultures who would dissect every tear, every tremor for gossip at their next society luncheon.
Three hundred guests. Three hundred pairs of eyes burning into me, some pitying, most hungry for the drama of watching someone else's life implode. The Kensington-Smythes, the Vanderbilts, the Wangs every family that mattered in New York's elite circles was here. Nathan had made sure of that.
This wasn't just a breakup announcement. This was a calculated public execution.
My mother's company Chen Technologies, the software empire she'd built from nothing before cancer took her five years ago I was already gone. I'd signed it over to Nathan just six weeks ago, right after he'd proposed this elaborate engagement party.
He'd said it would "protect our future together," that merging it with Cross Enterprises would expand both our legacies. That we'd run it together as husband and wife.
I'd believed him. I'd signed every document his lawyers put in front of me, too blinded by love and trust to have my own attorney review them.
The board had voted yesterday to make Nathan the permanent CEO. I'd seen the documents this morning in my email, sent from his assistant with clinical efficiency. My mother's legacy, the company she'd poured her soul into, was now entirely his. And by extension, the Cross family's.
I'd been a perfect fool.
"Aria, darling," my stepmother Constance cooed from her seat in the front row, her voice dripping with false sympathy as she dabbed at dry eyes with a handkerchief. "You understand, don't you? True love can't be denied. We can't help who our hearts choose."
She'd known. Of course she'd known. She'd probably orchestrated the whole thing, pushing Elena toward Nathan the moment she realized the Cross family's wealth dwarfed my inheritance.
My father sat beside her, his face carefully neutral. Richard Chen, once a brilliant businessman, now a hollowed-out man who'd let his second wife slowly poison every good thing in his life since my mother died. He said nothing. He never did when it came to his precious Constance and her daughter.
I should have cried. Should have run. Should have collapsed like the heartbroken girl they all expected.
Instead, I felt something cold and sharp crystallize in my chest, replacing the shock with something far more useful: rage.
I smiled.
It wasn't a kind smile. It wasn't gracious. But it was controlled, and that was what mattered.
"Congratulations," I said clearly, my voice carrying through the suddenly silent ballroom. Years of etiquette training kept my tone pleasant, almost warm. I lifted my chin, met Nathan's eyes across the distance, and saw the surprise flicker there.
He'd wanted me broken. Wanted me to scream or beg or make a scene that would justify his betrayal in the eyes of society. Poor Nathan, stuck with a hysterical woman. No wonder he fell for sweet, gentle Elena.
I wouldn't give him that satisfaction.
I turned on my heel, my white dress sweeping behind me like a queen's cape, and walked toward the exit. Each step was measured, graceful. The crowd parted before me like the Red Sea, their whispers following in my wake.
"Did you see her face?"
"Ice cold"
"Maybe she knew already"
"The Chen girl always was too proud"
Let them think I was running. Let them think whatever they wanted.
Because Nathan Cross had just made the biggest mistake of his life.
He'd humiliated me in front of everyone who mattered. Taken my mother's company. Flaunted his pregnant mistress my own step-sister at an engagement party meant to celebrate our union.
And I knew exactly how to return the favor.
Three hours later, I sat in the corner booth of Onyx, an exclusive bar in the Diamond District where membership cost more than most people's yearly salary. My third dirty martini sat half-finished on the table, and my phone buzzed incessantly with messages I refused to read.
I'd changed out of the engagement dress, burning it in my penthouse fireplace with savage satisfaction before slipping into a simple black dress that hugged every curve. If I was going to plot revenge, I'd look damn good doing it.