Chapter 4 - The Fourth Gift
The silence in the grand ballroom was so thick that the slow, rhythmic click of Nathaniel’s dress shoes against the marble sounded like thunderous hammer blows.
Victoria’s triumphant smile faltered for a microsecond, but she quickly smoothed her features, throwing her shoulders back and assuming a posture of injured elegance as Nathaniel approached.
“Nathaniel, darling,” Victoria began, her voice dripping with artificial sweetness as she took a step toward him. “Thank goodness you’re here. The staff made a terrible mistake setting up this absurd display right in the middle of our gallery path. I tried to ask her to move it quietly, but she became belligerent, and the poor table just slipped—”
Nathaniel didn't even look at her.
He walked straight past Victoria, completely ignoring her outstretched, diamond-encrusted hand, as if she were made of thin air.
He stopped at the edge of the ruined cake and broken glass.
Without a single care for his bespoke tuxedo trousers, the billionaire dropped to both knees in the middle of the mess on the marble floor.
The three hundred guests gasped in collective shock.
Nathaniel reached out, his large, powerful hands remarkably gentle as he gathered Lily’s small, shaking shoulders, pulling the weeping child away from the mess and into his own chest.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Nate,” Lily sobbed, her face pressed into his white shirt, leaving pink frosting smears across his lapel. “I’m sorry I ruined the party. Mr. Bun is sad.”
“Shh, sweetheart,” Nathaniel whispered. His voice was shaking—not with fear, but with an emotion so deep and raw that Elena had never heard it from him before. He reached down and picked up the missing ear of the ruined wooden rocking horse, squeezing it tight in his fist. “You didn't ruin anything. You didn't do a single thing wrong.”
He looked up at Elena. His dark eyes met hers, filled with an apology so intense it made her heart ache.
“Are you hurt, Elena?” he asked softly.
“No, sir,” Elena whispered, wiping her wet cheeks with the back of her sleeve. “We’re... we’re fine.”
Nathaniel carefully picked Lily up, carrying her in one arm as he stood up to his full, imposing height. He turned slowly to face Victoria Hale.
Victoria’s face had flushed a dangerous, mottled red under her heavy makeup. “Nathaniel! You are making a complete spectacle of yourself! You are kneeling in garbage in front of the board of directors! Put that child down and let the staff clear this up!”
“The only garbage in this room, Victoria,” Nathaniel said, his voice dropping into a low, terrifying register that vibrated off the high ceilings, “is standing in an emerald dress directly in front of me.”
A sharp, collective intake of breath echoed through the three hundred guests. Victoria’s mouth opened in absolute shock, her eyes wide with fury.
“How dare you!” she shrieked, her aristocratic composure shattering completely. “I am your fiancée! I am a Hale! My family built this city’s society while your grandfather was still working the docks! You dare humiliate me in front of everyone for a maid and her bastard child?!”
“Victoria,” a cold, stern voice interrupted from the front row of guests.
It was Harrison Hale—Victoria’s father—a silver-haired man with a bloated face, stepping out from the crowd with a nervous, sweating brow. “Nathaniel, son, let’s be reasonable here. Victoria was under a lot of stress tonight. The event planning... the pressure... she reacted poorly to a breach of protocol, but surely we can discuss this in private—”
“There is nothing left to discuss in private, Harrison,” Nathaniel said smoothly. He handed Lily gently to Mrs. Donnelly, who had rushed forward with a warm blanket, shielding the child from the crowd.
Nathaniel turned his full, unyielding attention back to Victoria.
“You destroyed three gifts tonight, Victoria,” Nathaniel said quietly, his voice carrying clearly to every corner of the silent room. “A wooden horse carved by a man who gives half his salary to an orphanage. A music box bought by a woman who has given twenty years of loyal service to my family. And a child’s trust.”
He reached into the inner pocket of his tuxedo coat and pulled out a sleek, flat black leather envelope tied with a dark red ribbon.
“The Fourth Gift,” Nathaniel said softly.
Victoria frowned, stepping back slightly, her instinct screaming that danger was approaching. “What is that?”
“You thought I asked you to marry me six months ago because I loved you, Victoria,” Nathaniel said, his voice flat and detached. “The truth is, I was lonely. I was tired of living in a house full of ghosts, and your father presented a union that seemed logical on paper. But three weeks ago, my internal auditing team noticed something strange in the Whitfield Foundation’s accounts.”
Harrison Hale’s face went completely grey. He took an involuntary step back into the crowd.
“What are you talking about?” Victoria spat, her voice trembling.
Nathaniel untied the red ribbon on the leather envelope.
“The Caroline and June Whitfield Memorial Children’s Trust,” Nathaniel said, staring directly into Victoria’s eyes. “A charity established six years ago to fund pediatric surgical units across Connecticut. In the last four months, three point two million dollars were quietly funneled out of that account through a shell corporation registered in the Cayman Islands under the name Emerald Luxury Assets.”
A wave of loud, shocked whispers rippled through the three hundred guests.
Victoria’s hands began to shake violently against her silk skirt. “That’s... that’s absurd! I don't know anything about offshore accounts!”
“You don't,” Nathaniel agreed coldly. “But your father does. And the wire transfers were authorized using the private digital signature key that was kept in my private study—the key you stole from my desk two nights after you moved your luggage into the east wing.”
Nathaniel pulled a stack of high-resolution bank documents, forensic digital tracking reports, and signed affidavits from the leather envelope, holding them up high for the room—and the four press photographers standing near the gallery—to see clearly.
“You didn't just come into my home to be my wife, Victoria,” Nathaniel declared, his voice cutting through the room like a silver blade. “You came to bleed my late wife’s memorial fund dry to pay off your father’s eight-million-dollar gambling debt to the Atlantic City syndicates.”
Victoria looked around the ballroom in absolute terror. The high-society peers who had smiled at her thirty minutes ago were now staring at her with looks of disgust, horror, and profound contempt. Her father had turned his back, staring blankly at the floor, knowing his family was utterly finished.
“Nathaniel... please...” Victoria whimpered, her voice cracking as she took a desperate step toward him, tears finally ruining her mascara. “It was my father’s idea! He forced me! I love you, Nathaniel! I swear I love you!”
Nathaniel looked at her. There was no anger left in his face—only a vast, hollow disgust.
He reached out, caught the gigantic five-carat diamond ring on her left hand, and pulled it off her finger with one swift, smooth motion.
“The engagement is off,” Nathaniel said clearly. “Security will escort you and your father off my property. The state prosecutor’s office has already been provided with these documents. I suggest you retain a very good lawyer.”
Four tall, uniformed Whitfield security guards stepped out from the side corridors, swiftly flanking Victoria and her father.
“Get your hands off me!” Victoria screamed, kicking her heels against the marble as she was dragged toward the side doors, her emerald gown twisting violently. “You ruined me for a maid! You hear me, Nathaniel?! She’s a nobody! You chose a nobody over me!”
Her shrieks faded down the long stone corridor until the heavy mahogany doors slammed shut, sealing the ballroom back into total, breathless silence.
Nathaniel stood in the center of the hall, holding the five-carat diamond in his palm. Without a second thought, he walked over to Mrs. Donnelly, took the diamond, and dropped it straight into the donation box sitting near the coat check.
May you like
Then he turned, stepped right up to Elena, and reached out his hand.
“Ms. Carter,” Nathaniel said, his voice soft, warm, and entirely steady. “I believe we have a birthday party to finish.”
