He Called It a Joke. I Called My Lawyers. Chapter 01

My fiancé knocked me out at his own promotion party.

When I woke, I was wrapped in plastic.

I was taped to a marble pillar.

There was a sign around my neck.

And three hundred people were laughing at me.

The sign said: ICE QUEEN. PLEASE THAW.

I couldn’t move. Layers of clear plastic wrap pinned my arms to my sides and crushed my ribs. Duct tape covered my mouth. Under the wrap, my cocktail dress was soaked through, because every few minutes someone walked up and poured champagne over my head.

“Is that Nora Whitfield? The Whitfield heiress?”

“Grant did this? Oh my God. For Lacey, right?”

“She looks like a frozen dinner.”

Phones were everywhere. Flashes burned my eyes. A guy from Grant’s sales team held his phone right up to my face and narrated for his livestream. I could see the comments scrolling on his screen. Laughing emojis. Hundreds of them.

I screamed into the tape. It came out as a pathetic little hum, and they laughed harder.

An hour passed. Then two. My arms went numb. My mascara burned my eyes. Nobody helped. Not one person.

The last thing I remembered was Grant walking me toward the coat room. He’d kissed my forehead and whispered, “Babe, just play along for a sec.” Then pain exploded at the back of my skull.

Right before everything went black, I’d seen it in his eyes. A flicker of hesitation.

He did it anyway.

Finally, the crowd parted. Grant Ellison strolled toward me in his new navy suit, the one I’d bought him for tonight. Behind him, holding his sleeve, was Lacey Monroe. His assistant. Small-town girl. Thrift-store dresses. Big, wet, innocent eyes.

She gasped and covered her mouth. “Oh my God, Grant. You actually did it!”

Then, softer, so everyone could hear how sweet she was: “But… won’t Nora be upset?”

Grant puffed out his chest. “Lacey said she’d never seen a real ice sculpture at a fancy party. So I made her one.” He grinned at his friends. “Nora won’t care. I’ve known her for twenty years. She knows it’s a joke.”

Joke.

He peeled the tape off my mouth. It tore my lip. He didn’t notice.

“Come on, Nor, don’t cry. It’s a prank. We prank each other all the time.”

We did. Water balloons. Fake spiders. Silly things.

Never this. Never in front of everyone. Never to make me small.

I tasted blood. I looked at his face, the face I’d loved since I was six years old, and for the first time, I didn’t recognize it.

So I threw my head forward and smashed it into his nose.

Lacey shrieked. “Nora! He was joking! How could you embarrass him like that in front of everyone?”

Embarrass him. I almost laughed.

Grant wiped blood off his lip. Then he reached out and patted my wet hair like I was a dog. His eyes slid away from mine. Guilty.

“Okay. Fair. I deserved that one. So we’re even now, right?”

His friends jumped in.

“Relax, Nora, it’s just a bit.”

“Lacey’s new. We were helping her feel included.”

“Don’t be such a princess.”

Someone finally cut the plastic. I stepped out of it, shaking, my dress plastered to my body, champagne dripping off my chin.

When I was six, I fell through the ice on Miller’s Pond. Grant was seven. He crawled out on his stomach and dragged me back by my red scarf. I’d spent twenty years believing I owed him my life.

So I’d paid. Quietly. Over and over.

He had no idea this promotion was one of those payments.

I looked at him one last time. Then I turned and walked out of the ballroom, barefoot, my heels still somewhere under the plastic.

“Nora!” His voice cracked behind me. “Babe, come on. I’ll take you to brunch tomorrow, okay?”

The old me would have stopped. Smiled. Said yes.

The old me was still taped to that pillar.

I didn’t look back.