Chapter 3 - The Expulsion
“Where is she?!” Cole shouted, pushing past Thomas into the grand foyer, his eyes wild and frantic as he swept the room. “Emma! Emma, talk to me!”
He stopped dead in his tracks as his eyes fell upon his older brother standing at the foot of the grand staircase, with Emma standing half a step behind him.
Cole looked disheveled. His hair was messily tossed from the sea wind, his expensive silk tie was loosened at his throat, and his hands were trembling violently.
“Emma,” Cole gasped, taking two steps forward across the marble floor. “Please... don't do this. Don't run to my brother. We need to talk about this privately. Just five minutes. Please.”
Before Cole could take another step toward her, Adrian moved.
It was not a hurried motion, but it possessed an immediate, overwhelming lethality that stopped Cole in his tracks. Adrian stepped directly between Cole and Emma, his imposing six-foot-three frame completely blocking Emma from Cole’s line of sight.
“Take another step toward her, Cole, and I will throw you down those front steps myself,” Adrian said softly.
Cole blinked in disbelief, his chest heaving.
“Adrian! Stay out of this! This is between me and my fiancé!”
“She is no longer your fiancé,” Adrian corrected smoothly, his voice dropping into a chilling register. “She returned your ring twenty minutes ago on the floor of a hotel room you rented with family funds.”
Cole winced, a flash of deep guilt crossing his features before being replaced by defensive anger.
“I made a mistake, okay?!” Cole yelled, waving his hands frantically. “It got out of hand! Tessa... Tessa was always coming around, she was flirting, she was pushing me, and I made a stupid error in judgment! But I love Emma! I was still going to marry her on Saturday!”
Emma let out a small, sharp gasp from behind Adrian.
Adrian’s dark grey eyes flared with a sudden, terrifying light. In one lightning-fast motion, Adrian crossed the distance between them, grabbed Cole by the lapels of his expensive Italian jacket, and slammed him hard against the oak paneling of the entryway wall.
The heavy sound echoed through the high ceilings of the foyer.
“You pathetic coward,” Adrian rasped, his face inches from Cole’s pale, terrified features. “You betray the woman who spent three years building a life with you, and then you stand in my hallway and blame her sister for your own lack of character?”
“Adrian... let go of me,” Cole choked out, trying to push his brother’s iron grip away from his chest. “You’re hurting me!”
“You don't know what real hurt feels like yet, little brother,” Adrian growled, his voice so low and lethal that even the servants standing in the corridor drew collective breaths. “I spent eleven years preserving father’s company so you could live a comfortable, privileged life. I gave you executive titles you didn't earn, expense accounts you didn't deserve, and a reputation you constantly tarnished. And how do you repay this family? By humiliating the finest woman in Port Mercy three days before her wedding.”
“I’ll fix it!” Cole pleaded, his eyes darting toward Emma, who was watching from the stairs. “Emma! Tell him to let me go! I’ll break it off with Tessa right now! I’ll never see her again! We can still have the wedding on Saturday!”
Emma stepped forward to the edge of the marble stair, looking down at the man she had loved for three years. Seeing him pinned against the wall, weeping and desperate, she felt no anger, no urge to scream. She felt only a profound, overwhelming sense of disgust.
“Cole,” Emma said, her voice clear and resonant in the quiet foyer.
Cole looked up at her, hope flashing across his tear-stained face. “Emma... baby, please.”
“If you were the last man on this earth, I would never let you touch me again,” she said quietly. “There is nothing left to fix. You destroyed it.”
Cole’s face fell, the last remnants of his arrogance shattering into pieces.
Adrian released his grip on Cole’s jacket, letting his younger brother stumble backward against the heavy oak front door.
“Vance,” Adrian called out smoothly without turning around.
Vance stepped out from the shadows near the coat rack. “Yes, Mr. Marston?”
“Escort Mr. Cole off the property. Change the security codes on the front gates, deactivate his garage clicker, and inform the front guard that if Cole sets foot past the stone boundary wall, he is to be removed for criminal trespassing.”
Cole stared at his older brother in utter, hysterical disbelief.
“You’re kicking me out of my own family home? For her?!” Cole screamed, his voice cracking with rage. “She’s not even a Marston!”
Adrian turned slowly to face his brother, smoothing the cuffs of his white dress shirt with absolute composure.
“She has more honor in her little finger than you have possessed in thirty-two years,” Adrian said coldly. “Get out of my house, Cole. Before I decide to review your corporate expense logs for the last five months and hand them directly to the district attorney.”
Cole went entirely pale. He knew as well as Adrian that using corporate shipping funds to purchase private jewelry and luxury suites for Tessa constituted grand embezzlement.
Without another word, Cole turned, yanked open the front door, and rushed out into the pouring rain, Vance following closely behind to ensure he left the grounds.
The grand front door clicked shut.
Silence returned to the high-ceilinged mansion, thick and heavy.
Adrian turned around slowly and looked up the stairs at Emma. The harsh, lethal expression that had terrified his brother melted away instantly, replaced by that same quiet, careful respect he had always shown her.
“I apologize for the scene, Emma,” Adrian said softly, stepping up the first two stairs toward her. “He will not bother you again tonight.”
Emma looked down at him, her heart hammering against her ribs.
“Adrian... what did you mean when you said you’d review his corporate expense logs?”
May you like
Adrian smiled a small, dark, wicked smile that sent a shiver straight down Emma’s spine.
“Cole thought he was being clever, Emma,” Adrian murmured. “He thought he could use my money to play games behind your back. He’s about to discover that everything he owns—his car, his apartment, his bank accounts, his executive title—belongs to me. And I’m taking every single bit of it back.”
