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Part 5: The Gala Execution

Desmond spared no expense for my thirtieth birthday gala.

He rented the grand ballroom of the Plaza Hotel. Over five hundred guests attended, including the most elite venture capitalists, tech moguls, and media outlets in the country. The room glittered with diamonds and champagne.

Desmond held my waist as we stood on the grand stage, smiling for the blinding flashes of the paparazzi.

He delivered a ten-minute speech about his undying devotion to me, attributing all of his corporate success to the “unshakable foundation of his beautiful wife.” The investors ate it up. A dozen men in tailored suits raised their glasses, shouting out early commitments for his upcoming Series C funding round.

A reporter from the front row raised a microphone.

“Mrs. Hayes! Desmond just gifted you a ten-million-dollar sapphire necklace. Did you prepare a reciprocal gift for him tonight? Will we have the honor of seeing it?”

I looked down at the reporter. I smiled, stepping up to the podium.

“Of course,” I said, my voice echoing clearly through the massive ballroom. “Giving a gift to your husband’s mistress is rather unprecedented, but I assure you, Desmond will absolutely love what I brought him.”

The ballroom instantly fell dead silent. The clinking of glasses stopped. Five hundred people held their breath.

“Hit the lights,” I commanded into the microphone.

The chandelier lights dimmed. The massive, high-definition projector screen behind Desmond and me flared to life.

There was a collective, echoing gasp from the crowd.

On the screen was a live video feed from the green room backstage.

Sitting in a chair, tightly bound with zip-ties, was Camille. She was still wearing the absurd, sheer French maid outfit. Her mouth was gagged with a pair of her own black silk stockings. Her mascara was smeared down her cheeks from crying in absolute terror.

(I hadn’t kidnapped her violently. I had simply paid the venue’s private security—who hated Desmond’s arrogance—ten thousand dollars to escort her into the room and secure her when she tried to sneak into his dressing room).

Desmond turned around. When he saw the screen, the blood vanished from his face.

“What the hell is this?!” Desmond hissed, grabbing my arm, his fingers digging into my skin. “Aria, turn that off! Have you lost your mind?!”

He let go of me and rushed to the front of the stage, addressing the horrified crowd.

“Please, everyone, do not misunderstand!” Desmond shouted, panic bleeding into his voice. “This is a theatrical prank! A joke! Please, put your cameras down!”

He spun back to me, his voice a lethal, threatening whisper. “Aria, cut the feed right now. You are ruining my reputation. Release her and tell them it’s a joke, or I swear to God I will destroy you.”

I didn’t flinch. I picked up my glass of champagne, took a slow, elegant sip, and stepped back to the microphone.

“Are you getting impatient, Desmond?” I asked loudly, ensuring every camera recorded my voice. “Of course I know what day it is today. It’s my birthday. It is also the day our marriage officially burns to the ground.”

I pulled a thick stack of documents from my clutch and dropped them onto the podium.

“These are my medical records from Mt. Sinai Hospital,” I announced. “They are verified and public. For the last five years, Desmond Hayes has publicly played the role of a doting husband desperate for a family. In reality, he has been using his executive secretary, the woman currently gagged on that screen, to crush up birth control pills and hide them in my daily supplements.”

The crowd erupted in shocked murmurs.

“When I briefly stopped taking the supplements due to illness, I conceived our child,” I continued, my voice steady despite the tears threatening to fall. “When Desmond found out, he didn’t celebrate. He ordered that same secretary to slip me an abortifacient.”

“She’s lying!” Desmond roared, lunging for the microphone.

I sidestepped him, and my private security team immediately stepped onto the stage, blocking him from me.

“I miscarried two weeks ago,” I stated, staring directly into the flashing cameras. “While I was bleeding out in the emergency room, my husband was in the stairwell, promising his mistress an estate in the Hamptons for carrying his illegitimate heir.”

“Shut up!” Desmond screamed, looking at the investors who were actively backing toward the exits. “Don’t listen to her! She’s mentally unstable! Her mother was insane, and she’s insane too!”

“Let’s see who is insane, Desmond,” I replied.

I pressed a button on the podium remote.

The live feed of Camille vanished. It was instantly replaced by the high-definition video of Desmond and Camille in the hotel suite, the audio of him begging her to have his child blasting through the ballroom speakers.

The investors didn’t just back away. They turned and fled.

“Desmond, our firm is pulling its capital commitment immediately!” one of his lead venture capitalists shouted over the noise, looking utterly disgusted. “You’re a liability! The board will have your head for this!”

Desmond rushed to the edge of the stage, begging them to stay, promising them increased equity, but they ignored him.

He turned back to me, dropping to his knees, the arrogance completely shattered.

“Aria, please,” Desmond wept, crawling toward me. “What do you want? I’ll give you whatever you want. I love you! I never wanted a divorce! The company is going to crash! Please, tell them you forged the documents!”

I looked down at the man who had played god with my body.

“When you poisoned me, did you give me a chance to negotiate?” I asked softly.

Suddenly, Camille burst onto the stage. The venue security had cut her zip-ties. She ran toward Desmond, weeping hysterically, throwing her arms around his neck.

“Desmond, save me!” Camille wailed. “She’s crazy! Let’s just leave! We have our baby!”

Desmond froze. He looked at the few remaining reporters filming them. He looked at his crashing empire.

Then, he stood up, grabbed Camille by the shoulders, and shoved her violently to the floor.

“Get off me!” Desmond roared, his face contorted in pure hatred. “You ruined my life! I was just playing with you! Do you really think I would leave a billionaire heiress for a cheap secretary? You aren’t worth a strand of Aria’s hair!”

Camille stared up at him, the illusion of her grand romance shattering instantly. “But… but you said you loved me. You said we would have a family.”

“I lied!” Desmond screamed. “Get out of my sight! You disgust me!”

I didn’t stay to watch the rest of the pathetic display. I turned and walked off the stage, exiting the Plaza Hotel through the side doors.

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