Chapter 4 - The Unraveling of the Engagement
The engagement party—or what was left of it—was supposed to be held at a high-end steakhouse in the Gold Coast on Saturday night.
According to social media feeds and frantic gossip whispered among mutual acquaintances, the turnout was abysmal. Out of three hundred and fifty invited guests, fewer than forty showed up. Most of David’s senior partners had sent polite regrets, citing prior commitments or sudden family emergencies. The high-society figures who loved nothing more than a lavish spectacle wanted nothing to do with a sinking ship.
By Sunday afternoon, the tension inside my parents' household had reached a breaking point.
I was at my penthouse apartment in Lincoln Park, reviewing lease renewals over a cup of black coffee, when my phone rang.
It wasn't Emma. It wasn't Mom.
It was David.
"Victoria," his voice was tight, strained, vibrating with a barely contained fury. "We need to talk."
"I don't think we have anything to discuss, David," I said calmly, taking a sip of coffee.
"Don't play games with me," he snapped, dropping the polite legal facade entirely. "You’ve completely destroyed our lives. My firm put me on administrative leave pending a 'cultural assessment.' My fiancée is locked in her bedroom refusing to eat, and your parents are talking about bankruptcy because half their corporate clients are cutting ties to distance themselves from the scandal."
"My parents' corporate clients are cutting ties because they realize my father's firm is coasting on outdated business models and toxic management practices," I corrected him smoothly. "Don't blame my real estate portfolio for your professional incompetence."
"You did this deliberately," David hissed through the phone. "You orchestrated the whole thing. You let us book Grandview just so you could pull the rug out from under us at the last possible second."
I let out a cold, humorless laugh.
"David, do you honestly believe I bought Grandview Manor eighteen months ago, invested twelve million dollars in historical restorations, and built a top-tier luxury hospitality brand just on the off-chance that your fiancée would eventually try to cut me out of her wedding?"
Silence on the line.
"The world doesn't revolve around your social calendar, David," I continued. "I bought Grandview because it was a brilliant undervalued asset in a prime location. The fact that Emma happened to want it for her wedding was a coincidence. The fact that she humiliated me and tried to erase my existence from her life was the only reason I exercised a contractual right I already possessed."
"You're a ruthless sociopath," he spat out.
"And you're a mediocre attorney whose career depended entirely on marrying into a family with social standing," I replied evenly. "If that's all you called to say, I'm hanging up now."
"Wait!" he shouted. "Emma wants to talk to you. Just... just listen to her for five minutes. Please."
Before I could refuse, there was a muffled scuffle on the other end of the line, followed by the sound of the phone changing hands.
"Victoria?" Emma's voice sounded small, ragged, and utterly defeated. Gone was the polished, arrogant tone of the bride-to-be who had looked down her nose at my career.
"I'm listening, Emma," I said.
"Is it true?" she whispered, her voice trembling. "Did you really buy Grandview before I even got engaged?"
"Eighteen months before," I said.
A soft, choked sob came over the line. "Why didn't you ever tell me? If I had known... if I had any idea..."
"If you had known, would you have invited me to the bridal shower?" I asked quietly. "Would you have let me stand in the family photographs? Or would you still have treated me like an embarrassing secret because I didn't work at Dad's firm and drive a BMW?"
Emma didn't answer. The silence stretched out for so long I thought she had hung up.
"I'm sorry," she finally whispered, the words sounding foreign on her tongue. "I was so caught up in the image of everything... the perfect wedding, the perfect husband, the perfect life... I couldn't stand the thought of anything looking imperfect. And I thought you were... I thought you were failing."
"Because failing fit your narrative of success," I said. "You needed me to be the struggling older sister so you could feel like the golden child."
"David and I broke off the engagement," she said suddenly.
I paused, my coffee cup halfway to my mouth. "You did?"
"He blamed me for everything," she cried softly. "He said I ruined his career because I couldn't get along with my family. He said if I had just kept you quiet, none of this would have happened. He never loved me, Victoria. He just loved the wedding."
For a fraction of a second, a flicker of sympathy touched my chest. But it was quickly replaced by the cold reality of who my sister was.
"I'm sorry you had to find that out this way, Emma," I said. "Really, I am. But you're twenty--eight years old. You have an MBA, you have a good salary at Dad's firm, and you have your whole life ahead of you. It's time to stop building your identity around what other people think of your image."
"What am I going to do?" she sobbed. "Everyone in Chicago knows. The invitations, the cancellations, the articles... I can't even walk into a restaurant without people staring."
"Then leave Chicago for a while," I said. "Take a sabbatical. Go to Europe, or New York, or wherever you want. Rebuild your life on your own terms, not Dad's."
"Will you... will you help me?" she asked, her voice barely audible.
May you like
I looked out across the park, watching the autumn leaves drift down onto the pavement below.
"I'll always be your sister, Emma," I said. "But I'm not going to fix this for you. You have to clean up your own mess. Just like I had to clean up mine."
