Papers scattered across the floor.
Medical records. Skin graft consent forms. All of them landing right at Arden’s feet.
Vivian’s signature on every one. A French doctor’s seal beside it.
Gideon’s eyes dropped to the papers. The color left his face.
He was fluent in French.
He knew exactly what those medical terms said.
“A skin graft…”
The words fell out of him like broken glass. He stepped back.
Away from Vivian.
Like she was something he couldn’t stand to touch.
“No. Gideon, let me explain.”
Vivian grabbed for his hand. He yanked it away.
“Don’t touch me.”
His voice was raw.
He was looking at the woman he’d spent twenty years protecting, and he didn’t recognize her.
“You were in that hospital for six months. You wouldn’t let me see your back.”
“You said you were afraid it would scare me.”
“You were waiting for the grafts to heal.”
The hall erupted.
Nobody had come to the auction expecting this.
Mrs. Mercer, the woman they’d all bowed to, was a fraud. A thief who’d stolen another woman’s life and her fiancé’s gratitude.
Arden was on her knees, scrambling to grab the papers, trying to rip them apart.
“They’re fake! All of them, forged!”
She screamed at Evan.
“You faked these. I’ll have you arrested.”
Evan pushed his glasses up and looked at her like she was a nuisance.
“Miss Arden, before you make any accusations, you might want to check your phone.”
Arden went still.
Her purse started buzzing. Then ringing. Then it wouldn’t stop.
The sound cut through the hall like a siren.
She frantically dug it out and answered.
Wallace Mercer’s voice tore through the speaker. The head of Mercer Group, screaming.
In the silence, every word carried.
“Arden, what the hell did you and your mother do?”
“Every supplier on the Suncoast routes just pulled out. Every single one.”
“Our mines are blockaded. Armed forces showed up an hour ago.”
“The banks aren’t just cutting us off. They’re calling in every loan we have.”
“Our stock crashed so hard the exchange halted trading. Ten minutes. That’s all it took.”
“We’re done.”
His voice broke on the last word.
The phone slipped from Arden’s hand and cracked against the floor.
She looked at me like she was seeing me for the first time. Like I was something that shouldn’t exist.
“You… you did this.”
It hit her then. Everything I’d said, none of it had been a bluff.
The Gryphon Black Card didn’t just represent money. It was a kill switch.
“Weren’t you going to give me that tea money, Miss Arden?”
She was falling apart in front of me. I didn’t raise my voice.
“Keep it. You’ll need it for Wallace’s bail.”
“Tax evasion. Smuggling. He’s never coming home.”
Arden folded. Her knees hit the marble.
Everything she’d built her identity on—the name, the money, the status—had been erased in minutes.
She crawled to my feet and grabbed the hem of my trousers.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
“We don’t want the bracelet. Take it back. Please.”
“Please, just leave the Mercer family alone. I’ll do whatever you want.”
She pressed her forehead to the floor, sobbing, body shaking.
I looked down at her the way you’d look at something stuck to the bottom of your shoe.
“Give it back?”
I kicked her away.
“Vivian didn’t steal a bracelet. She stole my mother’s life.”
“Tell me how you give that back.”
“You want to apologize? Go find the mass graves in the Suncoast Territories and apologize to those.”