Chapter 10 - The Fall of Grant Sterling
The grand gala turned into an arena of total humiliation.
Grant lay on the floor among shattered glass, blood pouring from his broken nose, soaking his rented tuxedo. Camille didn't even look back as two federal agents approached her, reading her Miranda rights on the spot for her complicity in the Cayman shell companies.
"Get off me!" Camille screamed, her mascara running down her cheeks. "It was Grant's idea! He forced me!"
"Save it for the judge, Miss Vance," the agent said coldly, snapping stainless steel handcuffs around her wrists and leading her away before the flashing cameras of the society press.
Two armed marshals hauled Grant to his feet. His face was swollen, his hair matted with cheap champagne, his eyes wide with wild, manic defeat. He looked across the ruined hall toward Nadine.
Nadine stood tall, radiant, untouched by the wreckage around her. She looked at him not with anger, but with complete, crushing indifference.
"You're nothing without me!" Grant yelled, spitting blood onto the marble floor. "You're just a fat girl who got lucky!"
"Take him out," the marshal barked, dragging him toward the service elevator.
The ballroom was silent for three seconds. Then, an elderly woman in the second row—the matriarch of the Astor family—began to clap. Another followed. Within moments, the entire ballroom erupted into thunderous applause, celebrating the fall of a tyrant and the rise of a woman who refused to be broken.
Roman turned to Nadine, pulling a silk handkerchief from his breast pocket. With infinite tenderness, he wiped a speck of dust from her collarbone.
"Are you all right, Nadine?" he asked, his dark eyes softening with genuine concern.
Nadine smiled, taking a deep, clean breath. "I have never been better in my life, Roman."
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"Then let's get out of here," Roman said, offering his arm once more. "We have a business empire to run."
***
