All Chapters of Addicted To The Arranged Bride: Chapter 71 - Chapter 77

***~~ZARA~~***“Sorry to interrupt you both,” Nanny said, suppressing a smile she clearly thought we hadn’t noticed. “But your mother and your friend are here to see you.”“Oh, really? My mom is here?” I exclaimed excitedly. “Okay, tell them we’ll be out in a minute.”“But how did they even know the address to this house?” Dante asked, turning to look at me with confusion written across his face.“We got dressed here before we left for the gala,” I explained. “Even Julia was here. She’s the one who did my makeup that night. My mom brought my dress over and we all got ready together right here before we headed out.”“Oh, that’s sweet,” he remarked, smiling softly. “No wonder you looked so gorgeous last night.”I smiled at him, and we both made our way to the living room together. His hand found mine somewhere along the way without either of us really deciding it.“Such a lovely smell coming from this house,” my mom exclaimed, and she stood up the second she saw me, pulling me straigh

***~~ZARA~~***“Okay, who is it?” my mom asked, her voice tight, leaning forward like the answer might somehow soften if she got close enough to it.Ethan’s expression shifted as he lifted his eyes from the laptop, and in that exact second my heart kicked into a faster, uneven rhythm, already bracing itself for whatever name was about to leave his mouth.“It’s Mr Edwards,” he revealed.“But he swore on his own life that he was innocent,” my mom said in confusion as all of us turned to look at her at once. “He insisted, over and over, that he had absolutely nothing to do with that missing money.”“Swore?” I repeated, latching onto that one word like it had teeth.“I remember him clearly,” she continued while she rubbed her hands together slowly like the memory itself was cold. “He used to be the accountant at your father’s company, back before everything fell apart. After the bankruptcy, we never heard a single word from him again. It was like the man dissolved into thin air the mome

***~~DANTE~~***What in the world had just happened back at my father’s house? I sat with that question the entire drive home, struggling to land on a single explanation that made any real sense of what I’d just witnessed.Something about those sudden apologies didn’t sit right with me, not even a little.Adrian and Dahlia dropped to their knees like they were auditioning for some daytime drama. They all wanted something out of that performance, that much I was sure of.The whole scene had felt rehearsed.And here’s the part that kept circling back in my head, refusing to leave me alone: my mother never once apologised to me. Not a single word in my direction.Every soft look, every careful sentence, all of it had been aimed straight at Zara.Something was definitely wrong here, I thought, watching the road blur past in long stretches of afternoon light, the kind of golden-hour glow that usually made everything feel calmer than it actually was.“Zara, don’t you think what happened b