---- Chapter 8 Amira Osborne POV: | went through with the wedding day. Not for him. For my mother. She had been so excited. She had spent months altering her own wedding dress for me, painstakingly sewing new lace and pearls onto the delicate fabric. It was the last gift she ever gave me. | just wanted to wear it one last time, to walk down that aisle and feel her close to me, a final, silent goodbye before | disappeared. | opened the door to the bridal suite, my heart full of a quiet, somber resolve. And then | saw her. Francine was standing in front of the full-length mirror, struggling to zip up my mother' s dress. My wedding dress. The delicate seams were straining against her larger frame, the fabric groaning in protest. The blood rushed to my head, a hot, roaring tide of pure rage. "Get it off," | snarled, my voice a low, dangerous command. "Get out of my dress. Now." She turned, a mocking smile playing on her lips. "Carter said | ---- could try it on. He thought it might look better on a woman with actual curves." Something inside me snapped. | lunged forward and grabbed the back of the dress, yanking the zipper down with a vicious tug. | didn't stop until | had stripped the gown from her body, leaving her standing there in her expensive underwear. She let out a shriek of feigned outrage and fled the room, clutching her arms over her chest. A moment later, Carter burst in. He saw me holding the dress, then glanced at the empty space where Francine had been. A murderous look flickered in his eyes, but he quickly composed himself. "Get dressed, Amira," he said, his voice deceptively calm. "It's time." He was planning to deal with me later, after the vows, after he had secured his picture-perfect wedding. | looked at my phone. A notification glowed: "Boarding in three hours." | could endure this for three more hours. | clutched my mother' s dress to my chest, whispering to myself, "Just a little longer. Then you' re free." | walked down the aisle on the arm of a distant uncle, the organ music swelling around me. The faces of the guests were a blur. All | could think about was the hum of the airplane engine that would soon carry me away. | reached the altar. | stood before Carter. As | looked into his ---- eyes, a sudden, powerful wave of unease washed over me. Something was wrong. And then it happened With a sound like tearing silk, my dress disintegrated. One moment | was a bride, the next | was standing nearly naked in front of two hundred guests, the precious fabric my mother had so lovingly stitched falling away from my body in tatters. | gasped, instinctively trying to cover myself as a wave of shocked murmurs and lewd gazes washed over me. | looked up at Carter, searching for help, for an explanation. His face was a blank mask. There was no shock, no horror, no sympathy. Nothing. He had done this. "Why?" | whispered, the word barely audible over the pounding in my ears. He leaned in, his voice a venomous hiss meant only for me. "This is what you get for disrespecting Francine. Let this be a lesson. You will never cross her, or me, ever again." The guests were starting to whisper louder, their judgment a palpable force in the room. | stood there, exposed and humiliated, clutching the shredded remains of my mother's love. "You have five minutes to go put something decent on and get back out here," Carter murmured, a confident smirk playing ---- on his lips. "Don't keep our guests waiting." He was so sure of his power over me. So certain that | would swallow this final, monstrous act of cruelty and come back to him. He turned to the crowd, raising his hands in a gesture of placation. "Just a minor wardrobe malfunction, folks! The bride will be right back." | turned and walked away from the altar, away from the snickering guests, away from him. But | didn't go to the bridal suite. | went to the service exit, where a janitor's closet stood open. | shed the last remnants of the ruined gown and pulled on a gray, shapeless cleaner's uniform. Arjun' s car was waiting for me at the back of the hotel, just as he' d promised. | got in, and | never looked back.