Chapter 5 - The Glass Rain
Vivienne Hawthorne tried to violently wrench her arm away from the maid's daughter.
“Take your hands off me, you little—”
Elise planted her feet and dragged the grown woman backward with a strength born of pure adrenaline. Amelia, still scrambled on the floor, realized the panic in Elise's eyes was real. Amelia grabbed the heavy fabric of the back of her mother’s dress and scrambled backward like a crab, pulling with Elise.
Julian, finally breaking from his shock, shouted from across the room. “Vivienne!”
Above them, the ceiling mount tore completely free from the plaster.
The chandelier dropped.
It was a thousand pounds of brass, glass, and wiring. It fell through the warm, golden light it had created just moments before. As it plummeted, the crystals whipped outward, the massive brass frame turning slowly as gravity violently claimed it.
It struck the abandoned, cake-covered table with a deafening, apocalyptic crash.
The sound was unimaginable. Heavy mahogany wood split and splintered with the force of an explosion. The remaining tiers of the cake burst outward, spraying frosting and sponge across the carpet like shrapnel. Thousands of heavy glass ornaments shattered instantly upon impact, exploding outward over the exact patch of floor where Amelia and Vivienne had been standing seconds before.
The sound rolled through the ballroom, shaking the floorboards, and finally ended in a horrific rain of smaller glass pieces raining down over the wreckage.
Then, there was silence.
A heavy, suffocating silence filled with the smell of plaster dust and electrical smoke.
Elise was on her knees on the floor, her small hands still locked around Vivienne’s wrist.
Amelia was pressed tightly against her mother’s side, her hands over her head.
No one was dead. No one was crushed.
The magnificent chandelier lay broken across the shattered table, its bent brass arms buried in pink frosting, crushed white roses, and torn linen.
Vivienne knelt on the floor, her breath trapped in her chest. She stared at the wreckage. It was barely three feet away from her face. She looked at the jagged brass spike that had impaled the spot where she had been posing for the camera.
A single, unbroken crystal drop rolled slowly across the ruined carpet. It clinked softly against the toe of Vivienne's designer shoe and stopped.
Amelia began to cry. Deep, wracking sobs of a terrified child.
She looked up at the stunned crowd, then looked at her mother.
“She saved me,” Amelia sobbed, pointing a shaking finger at Elise. “She pushed us out of the way.”
Vivienne slowly turned her head to look down at Elise.
The ten-year-old girl was breathing heavily. A stark, angry red mark in the shape of a handprint was clearly visible on the girl’s left cheek.
The aristocratic anger completely drained from Vivienne’s face. In its place, a sickening wave of realization washed over her. It was something rawer, darker, and infinitely harder to escape than fear.
She had struck a child. She had hit the little girl who had just ripped her and her daughter out from under a falling guillotine.
Rosa tore through the crowd of frozen guests. She dropped to her knees, sliding the last few feet, and pulled Elise into her arms with a fierce, desperate grip.
“Are you hurt? Elise, mi amor, are you hurt?” Rosa asked, her hands frantically checking her daughter's head, her arms, her back.
Elise shook her head. The adrenaline was fading, and the pain in her cheek was throbbing. Tears finally began to fall, mixing with the plaster dust on her face.
Rosa gently touched her daughter’s red, swollen face. Her eyes hardened. She turned her gaze up to Vivienne Hawthorne.
The maid looked at the billionaire. The power dynamic of the massive estate vanished in that single heartbeat.
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“You hit my child,” Rosa said, her voice shaking with a quiet, terrifying rage. “You hit her for saving yours.”
Vivienne opened her mouth. Her lips trembled. But no words came out.
