“Liora, why did you push me? Didn’t you already agree to marry into the Montgomery family?”
Her voice cracked, perfectly timed, as a tear rolled down her cheek. “You must still hate me. You smiled and acted generously, but deep down, you still wanted revenge.”
The room went still. A suffocating silence swallowed the air.
Arabelle’s best friend was the first to charge over and slap me hard across the face.
“I knew you had bad intentions! You faked fainting just to win pity, didn’t you? So Jaxon wouldn’t send you to the Montgomery family?”
Suddenly, the entire banquet hall turned into a storm of righteous fury. People grabbed whatever they could reach, pastries, glasses, scraps, and hurled them at me without mercy.
Cream and cake splattered across my body. I crouched in shame, trembling, clutching my injuries as laughter and scorn rained down like knives.
Then, a pair of leather shoes came into view, cold, polished, and unforgiving. They stopped in front of me.
Jaxon stepped forward and lifted his foot, then slammed it down on my head.
His sole ground into my scalp, forcing my head low until my cheek smeared against the sticky cream on the floor. The humiliation was bone-deep, unbearable.