CHAPTER TEN
The velvet-lined curtains of the Ashford-Wale library had been pulled back, allowing the harsh, unforgiving midday sun to spill across the polished mahogany floorboards. The sheer brightness of the room stood in violent contrast to the reality settling over the people inside it.
Grayson stood behind his father’s desk, his hands braced flat against the leather blotter.
His knuckles were white. Opposite him, sitting on the edge of a high-backed reading chair, was Olivia.
She was dressed in a soft, floral summer dress, looking exactly like the innocent, sweet woman he had fallen in love with.
Between them on the desk, a digital tablet was propped up, its screen glowing with the paused, high-definition security footage Ryder and Spencer had pulled from the pavilion.
"I don't understand," Olivia whispered, her voice trembling so violently she could barely shape the words. She stared at the frozen image on the screen: her Aunt Beatrice, holding a small plastic packet, while her Aunt Brenna leaned over a silver tray of champagne. "Grayson, what am I looking at?"
Grayson’s throat felt as though it had been lined with crushed glass. He reached out and tapped the screen, letting the footage play.
In agonizing clarity, they watched Beatrice crush the pills with a butter knife. They watched the exchange of cash. They watched Brenna empty the powder into two specific glasses.
"You are looking at the reason I lost my mind on the night of my parents' anniversary," Grayson said, his voice a low, hollow rasp that didn't sound like his own. "You are looking at your family deliberately dropping a highly concentrated, illegal synthetic narcotic into my drink."
Olivia stopped breathing. Her blue eyes widened, stretching so far they looked as though they might shatter. She scrambled backward in the chair, pulling her knees up as if the tablet itself were a venomous snake. "No. No, that can't be real. They wouldn't do that. They wouldn't..."
"The waiter confessed, Olivia," Grayson cut in gently, though the gentleness cost him every ounce of his remaining strength. "His name is Julian. We have his written statement. They paid him five hundred dollars to make sure those two specific glasses went to me, and to you."
"To me?" Olivia gasped, her hands flying to her mouth, tears immediately spilling over her eyelashes.
"Yes," Grayson nodded, a sickening exhaustion weighing down his broad shoulders. "One for me. One for you. But Kennedy accidentally intercepted yours before the waiter could reach you."
Olivia shook her head frantically, fresh tears tracking rapidly down her cheeks. The sheer magnitude of the betrayal was paralyzing her. She had genuinely truly believed her family was just tired when they fled the party. She had believed they were simply intimidated by the wealth.
"I didn't know," Olivia sobbed, looking up at him with utter devastation. "Grayson, I swear to God, I had absolutely no idea they did this! I didn't know!"
"I know you didn't," Grayson replied quietly.
He didn't doubt her innocence. He could see the horrified shock radiating from every line of her body.
"But I need to know why, Olivia. What was the plan supposed to be?
Why did your family drug me? What exactly did they want from us?
Have I ever said or done a single thing that made them believe they needed to interfere in our relationship? "
Olivia opened her mouth, but only a ragged sob came out.
She had no answer. She truly did not know what to say, how to explain it, or how to even begin apologizing for a crime she hadn't been aware of.
Her mind was spinning, trying to reconcile the aunts who had baked her birthday cakes with the women on that screen slipping narcotics into crystal glasses.
Grayson looked away from her, staring blankly at the wall of antique books, reeling from the catastrophic irony of the situation.
The guilt in his chest was mutating into a deep, acidic shame. He had trusted Olivia’s family. He had welcomed them into his home, seated them at his parents' table, and treated them with the respect owed to his future in-laws. And while they were smiling at him, they were plotting a felony.
But far worse than his misplaced trust in the Winters family was his catastrophic lack of trust in Kennedy.
He had known Kennedy Lockhart since she was in a crib.
He had watched her grow up. He knew her fiercely loyal heart, her unyielding pride, and her refusal to play dirty.
And yet, the moment the world had tilted on its axis, he had looked at Kennedy and accused her of a monstrous crime.
He had instantly suspected a woman he had known for nearly thirty years, while remaining blind to the malice of people he had known for barely two.
He did not know how to process the crushing shame of that realization.
The library doors clicked open.
Ryder stepped into the room, his expression locked into a mask of cold, unyielding stone.
Right behind him were Arthur and Eleanor Ashford-Wale.
Both of Grayson's parents looked as though they had aged a decade overnight. Eleanor’s face was pale and drawn, her hands clasped tightly in front of her, while Arthur radiated a quiet, terrifying patriarchal fury.
Ryder did not look at his brother. He looked directly at Olivia, who was still weeping into her hands.
"You need to call them, Olivia," Ryder commanded, his voice devoid of any sympathy. "Right now. Tell them to drive up from the rental house immediately. This situation is far too serious to ignore."
Olivia looked up, terrified, but she didn't argue. She pulled her phone from her purse with shaking hands and dialed her mother’s number.
While she spoke in hushed, panicked tones, Eleanor stepped forward, taking a seat on the sofa adjacent to Grayson’s desk.
She looked at Olivia, her eyes filled with a heartbreaking mixture of sorrow and utter disbelief.
"Olivia," Eleanor began, her voice trembling slightly. "Did anyone in this family ever give your relatives a reason to believe you would not be accepted here? Did Arthur or I ever imply that Grayson would not marry you?"
Olivia lowered the phone, wiping her face with the back of her hand. "No. No, Mrs. Ashford-Wale, you have been nothing but kind to me. You’ve been wonderful."
"Then why would they drug my son?" Arthur asked, his booming voice vibrating with restrained anger.
He stepped up beside his wife, resting a protective hand on her shoulder.
"What could possibly have made them think a stunt like this was necessary?
Do they make a habit of poisoning people when they feel insecure? "
"I don't know," Olivia cried, her voice cracking under the pressure of their collective stares. "I don't know!"
Thirty agonizing minutes later, Henry the butler escorted Linda, Beatrice, Brenna, and Chloe into the library.
The four women looked terrified. The moment they had received Olivia’s frantic, weeping phone call commanding them to come to the main estate, they knew the trap they had set had finally snapped shut on their own legs.
They stood in a tight, defensive cluster near the doorway. The moment they saw the tablet glowing on the desk, Linda let out a small, terrified gasp.
Olivia didn't wait for anyone else to speak. She pushed herself out of the reading chair and marched toward her family, her face flushed with a mixture of embarrassment and furious betrayal.
"How could you?" Olivia screamed, the sound echoing sharply off the high ceilings. "How could you do this to me? To him?" She gestured wildly toward Grayson, who was watching them with cold, dead eyes. "You drugged him! You brought drugs into this house! What were you thinking?!"
Linda flinched as though she had been struck. She looked at her daughter, then to the imposing figures of the Ashford-Wales. "Livie, honey, please calm down. We didn't… we never meant for things to go this far."
"It was supposed to be harmless," Aunt Brenna interjected, stepping forward slightly, her usual commanding tone wavering under the sheer weight of Arthur Ashford-Wale’s glare. "It wasn't a poison. It was just a natural enhancement. A little push."
"A little push?" Olivia snapped, her voice breaking hysterically. "It was illegal! It was assault! There is nothing harmless about drugging someone without their consent!"
"We were just trying to protect you, Olivia!
" Aunt Beatrice cried, twisting the strap of her purse.
"You’re in so deep with these people! We saw the estate, we saw the money, and we were terrified that he was just stringing you along!
If he woke up one day and decided he was bored of you, you would lose everything! "
Grayson stepped out from behind the desk. His towering frame seemed to swallow all the air in the room. "And you thought the solution to that insecurity was to drug my champagne?"
Linda swallowed hard, tears finally spilling from her eyes as the insanity of their logic was laid bare under the harsh light of reality.
"We thought… we thought if the two of you were alone.
If you drank it, and you became intimate…
a man with your pedigree, your morals, Grayson…
you would feel obligated to propose. We just wanted to make sure you married her. We wanted to secure her future."
A horrifying, silence descended over the library.
Eleanor let out a quiet gasp, raising a trembling hand to her mouth. Arthur stared at the Winters family as though they were an alien species.
"You wanted to secure a ring," Eleanor whispered, the sheer vulgarity of the confession leaving her breathless. "By forcing them into intimacy? By chemically overriding my son’s free will?"
"He loves her!" Chloe defended weakly, stepping closer to her mother. "It’s not like they were strangers! They were going to get married anyway! We just sped up the timeline!"