Chapter 1752:


    The Hewitts were not alone in their suffering. Christina had maneuvered every one of her enemies into surrendering vast portions of their wealth, and she had done it with devastating elegance.


    Two days prior, a carefully crafted report had spread across the inte like wildfire. It stated that every guest at the recent charity event was expected to contribute a minimum of ten million toward poverty relief. The story was apanied by leaked security footage showing Christina reminding the gathered elite to honor theirmitments and attend the fundraising event on time — footage that lent the im an air of undeniable legitimacy.


    The articles framed these wealthy families as paragons of generosity. Once the story reached an international audience, backing out was no longer an option. To refuse was to invite public humiliation on a global scale.


    The Hewitt family’s three hundred million donation had been squeezed out through abination of pressures: the viral report, and the Jones family’s pointed announcement that the Wade family — ranked fourth — had already donated three hundred million of their own. The implication was impossible to ignore. If the fourth-ranked family had given that much, any higher-ranked family seen giving less would be branded as misers in front of the world. With the Martel family adding their own quiet pressure to the situation, the Hewitts had no room to maneuver. They paid.


    In under a week, the Hewitt family had lost six hundred million dors. Their fury was immeasurable.


    Violette had been so certain of her n. She had assumed Christina would sell the ring quietly at a local auction in Lionesspaw — somewhere close enough that she could have a representative step in and buy it back at a fraction of its worth. Instead, it had appeared at a major international auction, where an anonymous buyer had purchased it for an extraordinary sum. The Hewitts had exhausted every channel trying to identify the buyer. They came up empty. The ring — the Hewitt family’s most prized and irreceable heirloom — was gone, and they had no way of knowing whose hands it had passed into.


    Violette sat rigid with fury, staring at Christina on the stage, her wine ss pressed between her fingers with a grip that threatened to shatter it. In that moment, she wanted nothing more than to end her right there.


    She was certain the international auction had been deliberate — chosen specifically to ensure the ring could never be recovered. And now, on top of everything, she was being forced into a marriage with Jaxen. The more she surveyed the wreckage of her circumstances, the more her rage consumed her.


    Then she remembered the Wade family’s n, and something cold and resolved settled in beneath the anger. Jaxen had already let something crucial slip: Christina was the long-lost daughter of the Jones family.


    Violette tilted her head back and drained her ss in a single, slow swallow.


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    She would throw the full weight of her support behind the Wade family. She would help them dismantle everything the Joneses had built, piece by piece — and when the time came, she would destroy Christina herself. She wanted Christina to watch, helpless, as her family’s legacy crumbled and the Jones name was erased from the country entirely.


    Alban had been waiting on the periphery for some time, watching for the right moment. When the opening finally came, he moved without hesitation.


    “Miss Jones.” He stepped into her path just as she turned to leave, cutting off her exit cleanly.


    “What do you want?” Her expression wasposed and gave nothing away.


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