Chapter 3 - The Unraveling of a Masterpiece“Nicholas, what is going on out here?” Cynthia demanded, her voice shrill and piercing. She looked at Emmett Stewart, then down at the crayons and plastic cups, and finally at me in my light-blue dress—the exact dress Nicholas had forced me to wear so I wouldn't clash with his aesthetic.
“Cynthia, sweetheart, please—” Nicholas reached for her hand, but she jerked away.
“Your family is turning our wedding into a circus!” she snapped, her eyes flashing with rage. “We spent six months curating the guest list! Every single person here is a potential partner, an investor, or someone of actual social standing! Why is a billionaire sitting at the table with the flower girls and your weird sister?”
The brutality of her words hung in the air. Your weird sister. It was a label I had worn like a second skin for as long as I could remember. But hearing it broadcasted across a ballroom filled with whispering elites didn't hurt the way it used to. It just felt pathetic.
Emmett let out a short, cold laugh. He stood up slowly, towering over both Nicholas and Cynthia.
“Weird sister,” Emmett repeated, tasting the words as if they were foul. “Cynthia, was it? Let me enlighten you. Last Tuesday, my executive board was staring down a hostile takeover and a disastrous product leak. My stock was plummeting by the minute. At two a.m., I received a seventy-page strategic brief and a keynote speech that completely flipped the narrative, restored investor confidence, and drove our market cap up by four billion dollars in forty-eight hours.”
He stepped closer to Cynthia, who involuntarily shrank back.
“That ‘weird sister’ of yours didn't just write a nice little blog. She saved my company’s skin. And while you’re standing here worrying about whether her dress matches your precious color palette, she is single-handedly managing a table of toddlers with more grace, patience, and leadership than anyone I’ve seen in the corporate sector all year.”
The silence in the room was deafening. Every pair of eyes was glued to Emmett, absorbing the magnitude of what he was saying. Four billion dollars. A ghostwriter of monumental influence, sitting right here in the Vermont countryside, eating lukewarm chicken nuggets and drawing dragons.
Nicholas’s face drained of what little color remained. His entire identity was built on being the successful, rising star of the family—the golden boy who secured a powerful corporate job, married into wealth, and held court with the elite. To discover that his ignored, dismissed younger sister operated in a tax bracket and sphere of influence he could only dream of touching was a psychological shattering.
“Jenna,” Nicholas whispered, his voice trembling with a desperate, pathetic plea. “Tell him... tell him it’s a joke. You’re just a freelance writer. You write lifestyle pieces, interior design tips... you don't do corporate restructuring for tech giants.”
I looked up at him, picking up a blue crayon and rolling it between my fingers.
“Nicholas,” I replied softly, “you never asked what I did. Whenever I tried to talk about my work, you told me my little hobby wasn't a real career. You told me to keep quiet and stay out of the way. So I did.”
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“You ruined my wedding,” Nicholas choked out, tears of pure humiliation finally spilling over his eyelids, ruining his carefully managed tough-guy facade.
“No, Nicholas,” Emmett said, adjusting his cuffs. “You ruined your own wedding the moment you decided that human worth is measured by seating charts and social status. Come along, Jenna. I’m taking you out of this tacky nursery. We have an actual business dinner to attend in Boston, and frankly, your company is worth infinitely more than the people in this room.”
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