He Gave Her My Home So I Took Back My Life Chapter 03
By the time the cab pulled up to the side entrance of Hale Manor, the string quartet in the garden was cresting into a high, sweeping melody.
Through the neatly trimmed holly hedges, I could see guests laughing over their drinks. White roses stretched all the way to the fountain, their petals catching the warm light of crystal candelabras, as if this dinner truly were flawless.
The staff member at the entrance saw me and immediately blanched.
“Mrs. Ashford, Mr. Ashford said—”
“This is my house.”
I didn’t slow my pace.
In the center of the garden, Vivian was surrounded by several members of the foundation board. She wore an ivory gown and sat in the seat that should have been mine, my mother’s pearl necklace resting against her throat.
She had obviously seen me, but she deliberately lifted her wineglass, pretending to listen as the others praised her and Graham’s “deep bond.”
Only when I stopped in front of her did she feign surprise.
“Nora? Why are you back?”
The chatter around us died.
I looked at the necklace.
“Take it off.”
Vivian raised a hand to cover the pearls, as if startled by my tone.
“I’m only borrowing it for one night. Graham said you wouldn’t mind.”
“He doesn’t get to make that decision for me.”
“Nora, tonight is important for the child,” she said, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “He just wants to see his family all together. Why do you have to humiliate everyone at a moment like this?”
The child again.
For the last fourteen months, that had been their excuse every time they forced me out of my own home.
I held out my hand.
“I’m not going to repeat myself.”
A flicker of ice in her eyes betrayed her before it vanished, so quickly it might have been a trick of the light.
Then she rose slowly, her voice soft. “Fine. If you insist on taking it back right now, I’ll give it to you.”
She turned and swept her hair to one side, exposing the clasp hidden beneath.
I reached to unfasten it. My fingertips had just brushed the cool metal when she suddenly grabbed the pearls at her chest and yanked hard.
The snap of the strand was barely audible.
The next second, Vivian threw herself backward into the rose bushes.
Pearls burst from the broken string, striking the stone path and scattering into the dirt and grass.
“Ah—”
She knocked over a decorative candelabra as she fell. It crashed to the ground, shattering a glass shade. A sharp edge scraped her arm, leaving several thin cuts that immediately welled with red.
The guests cried out, stumbling back.
Someone shouted for Graham. Someone else told a server to bring a first-aid kit.
I stood frozen, staring at the pearls rolling across the ground.
One was crushed under a guest’s heel, pressed into the mud.
Vivian leaned against the flower bed, clutching her arm as tears streamed down her face.
“Nora, I already said I’d give it back. Why did you have to push me?”
“I never touched you.”
She looked at me, her sobs growing louder.
“I just lost my balance. It’s not your fault. You were just so upset…”
The words were a defense, but they turned every eye in the garden on me.
When Graham came running out of the ballroom, that was the scene he found.
He didn’t even look at me. He pushed straight through the crowd and dropped to one knee beside Vivian.
“Where are you hurt?”
“It’s just a scratch.” Vivian shook her head, her voice trembling. “Don’t blame Nora. Seeing me wear the necklace… it was too much for her.”
Graham examined the cuts on her arm, his expression darkening by the second.
Only after the servers helped Vivian to her feet did he finally turn to me.
“Nora Ashford, have you lost your mind?”
The accusation echoed across the silent garden.
All two hundred guests stared.
“She snapped the necklace herself.”
“And now you’re lying?”
Graham’s eyes were glacial.
“You came back here without permission and attacked Vivian in front of everyone. We have foundation board members here, media, our most important donors. Do you have any idea what you just ruined?”
I didn’t answer.
I crouched down, parted the damp grass, and picked up the nearest pearl.
Mud coated my fingertips.
The second had rolled into a crack in the stone path. I dug it out with my nail. The third had landed at the base of a rosebush, its white surface already stained with dirt.
Before my mother died, she had fastened this necklace around my neck with her own hands.
She told me that when I found someone who truly cherished me, I should wear it on my wedding day.
Ten years ago, I wore it when I married Graham.
Now it lay broken among the white roses he had arranged for another woman.
My vision blurred. Tears fell into the dirt. I didn’t care about the eyes on me. I only knew that if I missed a single pearl, I might never get it back.
“Ma’am, let me help you.” A young server bent down, only to be stopped by Graham’s cold command.
“Go get the medical kit.”
The server hesitated, then had no choice but to retreat.
I stayed on my knees in the grass, searching.
Behind me, Vivian gave a soft sob, and Graham immediately told someone to bring her a coat.
He once said he would treasure everything my mother left behind.
But now, as I knelt in the mud, he stood only a few feet away, his concern reserved for the shallow scratches on Vivian’s arm.
I clenched the few pearls I had managed to find and looked up at him.
“This is the only thing my mother left me.”
Graham’s expression froze.
He looked at the pearls scattered across the ground, as if he finally remembered that at our wedding, he had fastened that very necklace around my neck himself.
But then Vivian sucked in a sharp breath, pressing a hand to her injured arm.
Whatever hesitation had flickered across his face vanished.
He steadied her and turned his gaze back to me, cold once more.
“Then this is still the result of your own loss of control.”