Chapter 3 - The Broken Reception
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Across town, the grand ballroom of the St. Regis Hotel was filled with white orchids, crystal chandeliers, and three hundred of the city's most powerful elites.
The orchestra was playing a soft waltz, but nobody was dancing.
Whispers rippled across the tables like a spreading fire. Dominic had been gone for over an hour. His new bride had disappeared shortly after him. The groom's mother was frantically trying to smile at reporters, while waiters stood awkwardly beside untouched champagne towers.
At the head table sat Victor Vance.
Victor was a man with cold gray eyes and silver hair, a billionaire who had built his empire on ruthlessness and absolute control. He tapped his signet ring against his crystal glass, his face darkening with every passing minute.
The heavy mahogany doors of the ballroom suddenly creaked open.
Dominic walked in first, his hair slightly disheveled, trying to force a confident smile onto his face. But behind him walked Celeste. Her wedding dress was torn at the hem, her eyes were swollen, and she wasn't wearing her diamond wedding band.
"Dominic," Victor Vance said, his voice quiet yet carrying across the head table like a blade. "Where have you been?"
"Victor, I apologize," Dominic stammered, stepping toward his father-in-law. "There was an urgent operational issue at the downtown property. A minor legal dispute that needed my immediate signature—"
"He's lying, Dad," Celeste cried out, her voice echoing into the silent ballroom.
The orchestra stopped playing completely. Three hundred guests turned their heads in absolute shock.
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"Celeste, please, not here," Dominic pleaded, reaching for her hand.
"He went to the hospital, Dad!" Celeste sobbed, pushing him away so hard he stumbled against a champagne tower. "He went to see his ex-wife! She just had his baby forty minutes ago!"
