Chapter 4: The House of Glass
The police were no longer just on their way; they were in the foyer, their boots echoing with the finality of a gavel. The Rival tried to speak, to frame a narrative of an accident, a slip, a tragedy of misfortune. But the Lover was already handing the phone to the lead detective.
He moved through the crowd, a man who had lost his heart but kept his resolve. He watched the handcuffs click shut around the Rival’s wrists. She wasn't just being arrested for a crime of passion; she was being dismantled by a web of evidence that had been waiting for this exact, catastrophic trigger.
The estate, the dynasty, the social standing—the Rival had murdered for the promise of it all. Now, she watched as her lawyers arrived, their expressions shifting from confident to defeated as the digital trail of her financial crimes hit the public servers. She hadn't silenced a rival. She had triggered a suicide pact for her entire life’s work.
