She swallowed.
“I told myself you were rich enough that it wouldn’t matter. I told myself Rafael loved you anyway. I told myself everyone in families like ours manipulated everyone and that this was just how powerful people lived.”
Her eyes dropped.
“Then three nights ago, I heard what Rafael planned to do after the transfer.”
Rafael said nothing.
Bianca continued.
“He wasn’t planning to divorce you.”
A strange chill moved through me.
“What was he planning?”
She looked at her brother.
And he looked away.
Bianca answered.
“To have you declared mentally unstable.”
The ballroom seemed to disappear.
“He had already spoken to a psychiatrist,” she continued. “A friend of Father’s. The plan was to document emotional instability after the wedding. Your grief. Anxiety. Outbursts. They were going to say you had become erratic after your mother’s death.”
I thought of every argument.
Every time Rafael had told me I was too emotional.
Every time he’d secretly recorded me crying.
Every time he’d asked, almost casually, whether anxiety ran in my family.
My stomach turned.
Bianca’s voice cracked.
“They were going to use the marriage and a medical incapacity petition to keep you from challenging the transfers.”
Rafael shouted, “She’s lying!”
Tomas looked at him.
“We have the physician’s emails.”
His mouth shut.
Bianca stared directly into the livestream.
“That was when I knew this wasn’t business anymore.”
Tears streamed down her face.
“So I recorded the dinner.”
Mara inhaled sharply.
Not Mara.
Bianca.
**Bianca had made the recording.**
“I sent it to Mara,” she continued. “And I sent the messages.”
I could barely speak.
“Then why the dress?”
Her expression broke.
For the first time all night, she looked ashamed.
“Because I knew you.”
I said nothing.
“You forgive everything.”
The words hit me harder than they should have.
“You forgave Rafael every time he chose me over you. You forgave him when he ruined your birthdays. You forgave him when he mocked you in front of friends. You forgave me every time I crossed a line.”
She held up my mother’s sapphire.
“I was afraid screenshots wouldn’t be enough.”
My throat tightened.
“So you humiliated me.”
“Yes.”
“You stole my gown.”
“Yes.”
“You wore my mother’s brooch.”
Her voice became almost inaudible.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Bianca shut her eyes.
Then whispered:
**“Because I needed to hurt you badly enough that you would not marry him.”**
No one in the ballroom moved.
“I knew Rafael would want some stupid prank before the ceremony. He told me we should embarrass you because you’d be too frightened of making a scene to react.”
She laughed once, brokenly.
“So I made sure you would react.”
I stared at her.
“You planned for me to walk away.”
“Yes.”
“That message you sent afterward?”
“To keep Rafael from realizing I’d betrayed him before Tomas arrived.”
My mind raced backward.
*Sorry you couldn’t handle a harmless joke.*
I had thought it was cruelty.
It had been camouflage.
Rafael stared at his sister with naked hatred.
“You ruined everything.”
