Chapter 7 - The Shattered Crystal
The cold steel of the gun dug painfully into Evelyn’s ribs. The ballroom around her seemed to blur, the cheering of the three hundred guests turning into a distorted hum.
Dr. Sterling’s grip on her shoulder was like a vice. He leaned in closer, smiling thinly for the benefit of any guests who might glance their way. To the rest of the room, it looked like an older gentleman kindly assisting a clumsy waitress who had just dropped a tray of glasses.
“You really are a foolish girl,” Sterling murmured, his breath hot against her ear. “Did you honestly think you could walk into a room full of billionaires and stop the tide? We own this world, Evelyn. You just clean it.”
Ten feet away, at the center of the spotlight, Sloane guided Grant’s trembling hand over the silver cake knife. Grant looked terrible. Sweat beaded on his pale forehead, and his breathing was shallow.
“Smile, darling,” Sloane cooed loudly enough for the front row of guests to hear. “Just one small bite for the cameras, then you can rest.”
She sliced a small piece from the poisoned top tier. She lifted it delicately onto a silver plate and picked up a fork.
Evelyn’s heart pounded against her ribs, matching the frantic rhythm of the string quartet. If Grant took that bite, he would be dead before the ambulance cleared the front gates. If Evelyn moved, Sterling would pull the trigger, and her mother would be next.
She looked at Grant. She remembered the day she had accidentally dropped a priceless vase in the hallway. Sloane had screamed at her, demanding she be fired. Grant had quietly swept up the shards himself, handed Evelyn a handkerchief for her tears, and told Sloane the vase was ugly anyway.
He was a good man. He didn’t deserve to die surrounded by vipers.
And her family didn’t deserve to live in fear.
Evelyn’s gaze dropped to the shattered champagne glasses she had dropped on the marble floor.
I will not be invisible anymore, she thought.
Evelyn didn’t try to pull away. Instead, she leaned her weight entirely into Sterling, letting her knees buckle as if she were fainting from terror.
Sterling’s grip slipped for a fraction of a second as he tried to support her dead weight.
In that split second, Evelyn dropped her hand, grabbed a large, jagged shard of broken crystal glass from the floor, and drove it upward, burying it deep into the fleshy part of Sterling’s thigh.
Sterling let out a muffled, choked gasp of agony, his grip on the gun faltering as his leg buckled.
Evelyn didn’t wait. She shoved him backward with all her strength and bolted toward the cake table.
“Stop her!” Sterling hissed through gritted teeth, clutching his bleeding leg.
Two massive security guards stationed near the stage saw the commotion and sprinted across the ballroom.
But Evelyn had a head start, and she had the desperate speed of a woman fighting for her life.
Sloane was raising the silver fork to Grant’s lips. Grant’s eyes were half-closed, his mouth opening weakly.
“Grant, don’t!” Evelyn screamed.
Sloane’s head snapped toward the sound. Her eyes went wide with shock as she saw Evelyn hurdling the velvet ropes.
“Security!” Sloane shrieked, dropping the fork.
Evelyn didn’t slow down. She hit the cake table with the force of a freight train.
She grabbed Sloane by the shoulders of her hundred-thousand-dollar silk gown. Sloane clawed wildly at Evelyn’s face, her perfect mask of sanity completely fracturing.
“You little bitch!” Sloane screamed, raising the silver cake knife like a weapon.
Evelyn dodged the clumsy swing, twisted her grip on Sloane’s shoulders, and shoved with every ounce of adrenaline in her body.
Three hundred wedding guests gasped in unison as the beautiful bride was launched forward.
Sloane hit the massive, six-tier wedding cake face-first.
The entire structure collapsed backward with a sickening, wet thud, sending an explosion of white frosting, chocolate cake, and crystal supports crashing onto the marble floor.
The groom dropped the silver knife.
The string quartet abruptly stopped playing.
Security guards tackled Evelyn from behind, slamming her hard onto the frosting-covered floor, pinning her arms behind her back.
Phones rose instantly above the tables, camera flashes blinding the room.
Sloane scrambled backward on her hands and knees, covered from perfectly coiffed hair to silk hemline in thick, dark chocolate frosting. She looked like a monster emerging from mud.
She wiped the cake from her eyes, spitting out frosting, and let out a scream that turned the room colder than a morgue.
“Get it off me!” Sloane shrieked, clawing frantically at her own face and throat, her eyes rolling with pure, unadulterated terror. “Wipe it off! That cake is poisoned!”
The ballroom descended into absolute, stunned silence.
The only sound was Sloane’s hysterical sobbing as she desperately tried to scrape the chocolate from her skin, terrified that the lethal dose of digitalis would absorb through her pores.
May you like
Evelyn, pinned to the floor by the guards, managed to twist her body. She reached into her apron pocket and pulled out the small, empty glass vial she had taken from Sloane’s hollow pearl necklace two days ago. She raised it high into the air between two trembling fingers.
“I know,” Evelyn said, her voice ringing out clear and steady across the silent, horrified ballroom. “You put it there.”
