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Chapter 2

Author: Adam
The steward took it, glanced at it once, and immediately called out with the utmost respect, "Donna. Please, this way to the second floor."

A ripple of shock ran through the crowd.

Someone muttered under their breath, "Did you see that? That looked like the Thorne family crest."

"No way. She carries the crest, and he called her Donna. Don't tell me she's Don Thorne's wife?"

The rustling murmurs wouldn't let up, and they were honestly starting to grate.

A cold edge sharpened in my eyes, and I turned to walk away, only for a cool, strong hand to clamp down hard around my wrist.

Eli's grip was heavy enough to nearly crush the bone, his cool palm carrying that cold scent that belonged to him alone.

It was the scent the old me had known best, and now it did nothing but turn my stomach.

A panic I couldn't read churned in his eyes, his knuckles digging into my flesh, refusing to loosen even a fraction. "You're married? And to Leon Thorne, of all people?"

Karina stood off to one side, her shrill laughter piercing enough to make the whole hall's ears ache.

She reached up and hooked her arm through Eli's other one, pressing herself deliberately against him, cutting a sidelong glance at me full of spiteful mockery.

"Eli, don't let her fool you. Women like her will fabricate absolutely anything. There's no way the Thorne family would take in a disgraced traitor. She probably stole that invitation with some dirty trick!"

"She has bad records, doesn't she?"

The guests around us burst into whispers again.

Scraps of ridicule and appraising looks landed on me, most of them following Karina's lead and quietly drawing their own conclusions, their eyes turning more contemptuous by the second.

Eli's brows twisted into a hard, cold crease, and his grip on my wrist tightened another degree.

There was a barely perceptible edge of anxiety in his voice. "Layla, tell me the truth. Where did you go these three years, and what did you do? You're being so reckless. If you anger the Thorne family, even I won't be able to protect you. Be good, and leave now with my men."

I let out a low laugh.

I wrenched free of his hold with a hard jerk. "Protect me?"

I lifted my eyes and looked straight at him, biting off each word, my voice cold as ice. "Back when you threw me out of the mansion, pinned the theft of family secrets on me, and let the whole world spit on me, why didn't you think to protect me then? Eli, what makes you think a few soft words now would send me chasing after you like a dog again, the way I used to?"

His frame stiffened slightly, his thin lips pressing tight, and that fleeting hesitation surfaced in his eyes once more.

Yet what came out of his mouth was as lofty as ever. "You know she's Anthony's daughter. Anthony held enormous power back then. I couldn't ruin her name. There is nothing I can do."

I couldn't be bothered to argue with him any longer, and turned aside to leave. "Steward. Take me up to the second floor."
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  • Strangers in the End   Chapter 12

    Anthony watched his daughter die on the spot before his own eyes, and a broken wail wrenched itself from his throat.He seemed to age ten years in an instant, crumpling in on himself, without a shred of strength left to struggle.Gordon closed his eyes, and when he opened them again there was nothing left but indifference.He turned to Leon and bowed in apology. "Don Thorne, it was the Perrone family's failure to keep our own in line that brought about this tragedy. Anthony's crimes are beyond pardon. By the old family law, he will be stripped at once of all property and command of arms, struck from the Perrone line, and imprisoned for life at the quarry deep in the northern mountains, never to set foot outside the pit again.""Would that satisfy you?" he asked humbly.Leon said nothing, only turned his head to me, signaling that the decision was mine.I nodded. "The Perrone family raised me, and I owe them that. Deal with Anthony by the family law."Gordon waved a hand as if a weight

  • Strangers in the End   Chapter 11

    Anthony slumped down onto the cold steps, his whole body shaking like a leaf.Karina was pinned hard to the marble floor by two bodyguards, her gown scuffed to rags, her face a smear of tears and foundation, her shrill wailing setting the whole gallery ringing.Leon was just about to speak and hand down the punishment when a dark mass of black-clad figures suddenly surged up from below.The tread of leather shoes on the steps was heavy and even, as all twelve elders of the Perrone family made their entrance.At their head, Gordon leaned on an ebony cane, his grizzled brows knotted tight.Every man behind him wore a gun at the waist glinting cold, and in an instant they had Anthony and his daughter surrounded.Gordon first bent low toward Leon. "Don Thorne, Anthony and the rest will be dealt with by us according to family law. We wouldn't dream of troubling you to raise a hand."Anthony seized on it like a drowning man on driftwood, scrambling over on hands and knees, his voice hoarse w

  • Strangers in the End   Chapter 10

    In the footage, I went to the archive room as usual to check the accounts.The camera caught it clearly, too: when I left the archive room, my hands were empty.And after I'd gone, Karina, in an extravagant gown, slipped into the room, opened the safe, and hurried off with a stack of classified files tucked against her chest.Before she left, she even made a point of wiping away her own fingerprints.The whole hall exploded, murmurs surging up on every side.Karina looked at her own profile, sharp and clear on the screen, and a violent shudder ran through her as she shrilled back, "This is fabricated! You got someone to doctor the footage! Eli, say something, it was you yourself who ruled she was the thief back then!"She whipped her head around toward Eli at the door of the box across the way, desperate for some shred of support.Eli stood frozen where he was.Beneath the silver-gray hair, his features were ashen, his lips opening and closing again and again without a single word comi

  • Strangers in the End   Chapter 9

    Not a single guest below dared breathe a word.Every gaze was nailed to the second floor, and no one dared break the quiet.Anthony forced what remained of his arrogance onto his face, pushed aside the bodyguard in front of him, and made a deliberate show of composure, though his trembling fingertips had already betrayed his fear."Layla, don't you forget, it was the Perrone family that raised you. If you kill us, that makes you a traitor all the same.""Kill you?"I laughed softly and stepped slowly forward, looking down on the little group of them.The pistol hung loose at my side, my fingertips idly stroking its cold body, my presence heavy enough that the two of them shrank back on instinct."Oh, I won't kill you. After all, sometimes living hurts far more than dying does.""My patience has limits, Anthony. In front of everyone here, why don't you tell them how you framed me back then."Before the words had faded the crowd was stunned, for that affair three years ago had been the b

  • Strangers in the End   Chapter 8

    That cry of "Don" was like a thunderclap, bursting through the dead-silent hall.He came on against the light, the hem of his black coat sweeping with each step, the cold white glow tracing the knife-sharp line of his profile.There wasn't a shred of warmth in those deep-set eyes, as though he were looking down on a swarm of ants."Who gave you the nerve to point a gun at my wife?"His voice wasn't loud. It even carried a lazy, offhand ease, yet it bore a suffocating authority that landed heavy on every heart in the room.Anthony's arrogant, mean face froze in an instant, his pupils shuddering violently.He stared fixedly at Leon, lips trembling, staggering two uncontrolled steps before he barely caught his balance."D-Don Thorne?"Anthony's voice was as dry as sandpaper scraping. "You just said... she's your..."Leon didn't look at him, only climbed the stairs at a measured pace.The sound of his leather shoes on the marble struck at Anthony's taut nerves, one beat after another.He c

  • Strangers in the End   Chapter 7

    "She's lying. She's a con artist with a mouth full of lies!"Karina shouted, beside herself."You're a reject the Perrones threw out. No evidence, no witnesses, just slander made up on the spot." Anthony scoffed. "Why should anyone here believe a word of it?""It doesn't matter if you don't believe me. In the face of absolute power, everyone shuts their mouth.""That's the lesson the two of you taught me all those years ago."I pulled my coat open, revealing a small, finely wrought thorned-rose crest of metal pinned at the breast.It was the token Leon had given me himself, the mark of the Donna of the Thorne family.Anthony's pupils shrank sharply. He lunged forward, and before I could stop him, swung his hand out in a vicious slap.Clang!A crisp, jarring crack split the air.His slap knocked the delicately crafted thorned-rose crest to the floor.The toe of his shoe ground down on it hard, and the intricate rose pattern warped and buckled in an instant, its edges splitting into crac

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