Chapter 10
No one revealed Jenna’s complete client list.
No confidential contracts were exposed.
The wedding did not collapse beneath the chandeliers.
The family conflict did not resolve with an apology, forgiveness, or a dramatic exit.
The ballroom remained beautiful.
The flowers remained enormous.
The gold chairs gleamed.
The children’s table still held crayons, chicken nuggets, a juice box, a teddy bear, a toy truck, and the small dinosaur Parker had declared dangerous to mean people.
Jenna stood beside it in her pale-blue satin dress, composed and wounded in a way Nicholas could no longer dismiss.
Emmett Stewart waited respectfully at her side.
He did not take over.
He did not turn her into a spectacle.
He simply stood there, making it impossible for Nicholas to pretend Jenna was invisible.
Nicholas looked from Emmett to Jenna.
Then to the investors watching from the head table.
Then back to Emmett.
The realization arrived slowly and brutally.
Jenna was not merely someone Emmett knew.
She was someone he trusted.
Someone he had hired.
Someone whose words Nicholas himself had praised without knowing they were hers.
Someone professionally connected to the billionaire Nicholas had spent months trying to impress.
And Nicholas had seated her beside crayons.
His bride stared at him with new uncertainty.
Guests whispered behind lifted champagne glasses.
Parker pushed the toy dinosaur closer to Jenna like an offering.
Jenna looked at Nicholas one last time.
Not with triumph.
With dignity.
That was worse.
Because triumph would have made this a fight.
Dignity made it a judgment.
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Nicholas stood frozen beneath the chandeliers, finally understanding that he had not hidden his sister from the important people.
He had shown the most important person in the room exactly who he was.
