She Forgave the Crush Who Ruined Her Mom, I Divorced Chapter 08

She Forgave the Crush Who Ruined Her Mom, I Divorced Chapter 08 The Caged Madness Beneath the Revenge Plot

Back inside my private office, she twisted the lock shut and blocked off every trace of what had just unfolded between us.

“How’d I pull that performance off?”

I slouched back in my executive leather chair, utterly bored, exhaling slow swirling rings of cigarette smoke A dry mocking huff rumbled out of my throat.

“Your act wasn’t half bad. Crawl over to me.”

Sloane’s features froze for a beat, heavy helplessness weighing her tone.

“You always talk to me like this.”

She sank slowly to her knees and crept forward on all fours, rubbing the soft curve of her cheek against my palm. When she caught the cold unreadable look in my eyes, she panicked, convinced her show had faller flat and failed to satisfy me.

“Do anything you want to me. Tear me to shreds, burn every part of my life to the ground-I won’t fight it.”

Just as I’d laid out to her before: drag every last one of her heinous secrets out into broad daylight. Let every colleague superior and friend witness the filthy truth of who she truly was. Let the whole world revile and spit on her before locking her away behind prison bars.

Every person she’d once scorned would hurl vicious insults at her. Everyone she’d brushed off with icy indifference would snicker at her ruin. Every man she’d coldly rejected would jeer at her downfall.

Her inflated pride would get crushed to dust, every scrap of her self-worth shattering completely, and she’d break exactly how I’d always wanted to see her.

Sloane’s mind spun with quiet confusion, wondering if Elias’s resolve had softened, if all this chaos stemmed from him growing conflicted. That ran entirely counter to the bargain we’d struck. Her own fate meant nothing to her; all she cared about was catering to his warped cravings. Elias’s emotional threshold had always been impossibly high-nothing ever managed to stir real feeling in him. All he’d ever craved was watching her crumble, so why couldn’t she give him exactly what he needed?

So she’d followed every step of my plan to the letter: hire specialists to abduct Zach and subject him to heavy hypnotic conditioning. Plant fabricated false memories in his mind, making him fully believe we’d snuck off to a hotel suite on our wedding night, consumed by an inseparable, burning infatuation for one another. None of that had ever been real-Sloane had never cheated on me once.

A bitter hollow smile tugged at her lips.

“I’ve long since braced myself for this day to come.”

“If this is what it takes to mean something to you, then it’s all worth it.”

I’m the one who’s truly unhinged, the broken one beneath everything.

Back when we were still in middle school. Zach’s parents cooked up false corruption charges against my family solely for financial gain. The Elias family’s old-money empire crumbled overnight without a single line. I stood there helpless, watching my own mother and father leap from a high-rise building to their deaths; warm sticky blood splattered all across my face, coating every inch of my skin. I’d been left a total orphan after that night.

I’d always known Zach held a long-time crush on Sloane, so I pushed myself relentlessly to ace every exam. transfer into his high school where she studied, and even fought to get accepted into the exact same university as her. Yes-I’d set out to lure her from the very start.

Sloane was no fool; she’d seen my hidden agenda clear as day from the beginning. But she’d starved for genuine affection her entire life. Her parents’ marriage was nothing more than a cold business alliance, never once showering her with love. Her father was a chronic womanizer who barely set foot in their mansion, always using “family outings” as an excuse to sneak off and meet his mistresses. Her mother’s sanity frayed completely from the loneliness and betrayal, taking all her rage and torment out on Sloane day in, day out. Raised inside such a warped, toxic household, her mind had fractured long before I ever crossed paths with her.

I’d never been her saving grace. I was merely another gilded cage to trap her inside. To help me carry out my years-long revenge scheme, Sloane rebuilt every branch of the Elias corporate empire from the ground up. The mother and father the public knew, alongside all her supposed relatives and childhood friends? Every single one was a hired paid actor. It’s laughable to even call them her family-all they’d ever been were greedy, predatory jackals waiting to sink their teeth into her wealth. As for those incriminating hotel tryst footage everyone believed? Nothing but AI deepfake face swap edits.

I won’t lie-after hearing the full extent of every terrible thing she’d endured growing up, a tiny flicker of pity stirred inside me. But my hunger for vengeance still burned hotter than any fleeting sympathy I felt. I wanted Zach to taste the high of thinking he held all the power, only to lose absolutely everything he’d ever cared about in one brutal blow.

The hypnosis procedure worked flawlessly. Dozens of artificial, fabricated memories rooted themselves deep inside his brain without a shred of suspicion from him; he fully convinced himself Sloane was head over heels in love with him. I brushed my fingers gently over Sloane’s cheek, my expression light with dark amusement, yet my eyes swirled with tangled, conflicting grief and rage. She’d lost her mind long ago-and truth be told, so had I.

Every twisted chapter of this ordeal was bound to reach its inevitable end sooner or later.

Shortly after the hypnotic manipulation was uncovered, Zach stood convicted and handed a lengthy prison sentence. By the time the verdict landed, his body was covered in raw scarring and brutal injuries; his mental state had deteriorated rapidly, leaving him perpetually delirious and incoherent. Right before his mind slipped away entirely, he filed a flood of criminal reports against Sloane, exposing massive corporate financial fraud and every illegal scheme she’d run. Within weeks, her company’s entire capital chain collapsed completely, leaving the business bankrupt beyond repair.

Zach screamed frothing, unhinged curses as officers dragged him away.

“Sloane! Elias! You two raving lunatics, sick monsters-you’ll rot for all the evil you’ve done!”

“It was the pair of you that destroyed my entire bloodline! The both of you deserve to burn to the ground!”

No single soul within the courtroom believed his wild, unhinged rants.

The next morning, every major news outlet blared headlines announcing Sloane’s suicide-she’d jumped

a-skyscraper to her death.

“Elias, don’t sink into sorrow over this.” Bianca’s voice softened, her gaze warm and tender.

“I’ll stick by your side from now on, take care of everything you need.”

I gave her a quiet nod, pressed a brief gentle kiss to her lips, and pulled back to step away.

“Are you sure you don’t want to stay over tonight to keep you company?”

I waved my hand dismissively.

“I’m fine, I just need to head home and rest for a bit.”

I walked out under her lingering, heartbroken stare, turning my back and heading straight back to the

empty estate.

The entire mansion was swallowed in pitch-black darkness. I wandered down the hallway into my private study, twisting a heavy iron key to unlock the hidden basement door.

Sloane stepped forward with a bright, soft smile, looping both arms tight around my neck.

“You’ve come.”

“Mm, I’m here.”

There’s still a long road stretching out ahead of me, countless more schemes and scores left to settle before I’m truly done.