Chapter 359
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Chapter 359:
Carmen went completely still. The entire greenhouse seemed to stop.
“What?” Carmen breathed.
“It is a family secret,” Jocelyn said, leaning closer. “Seven years ago, Justin simply appeared at the estate with a newborn baby. He told the family the mother had died in a car accident. He refused to name her. He has been a single father ever since p>
Seven years ago. A car crash. A lost memory. A baby without a mother. A man who never married.
The pieces slammed together in Carmen’s mind with the force of a freight train.
A sharp, agonizing pain tore through her stomach. She shot to her feet so suddenly her chair scraped violently against the stone floor. Her elbow caught the teacup, sending it crashing to the ground in pieces.
“I have to go,” Carmen gasped, clutching her stomach. “I have to go back to the city. I need to see my medical files p>
Jocelyn rose immediately and grabbed Carmen’s arm to steady her. “I will have Gaston’s driver take you right now p>
𝖣оn’𝗍 m𝘪𝘴𝗌 n𝖾𝘄 𝘳e𝗹𝖾𝖺sеѕ 𝘰 ѕ.сo𝗆
Carmen nodded weakly, her vision swimming with a nauseating blend of panic and fragmented memory. Every shadow in the Collins estate now felt like a cage she had once nearly died trying to escape. She leaned heavily on Jocelyn, desperate to get out before the spider returned to check his web.
The bleak concrete reality of the Brooklyn Detention Center was a stark contrast to the opulent mansions of Long Island. The visiting room smelled of bleach and despair.
Aspen Schneider sat behind a thick wall of bulletproof glass, wearing a baggy orange jumpsuit. Her perfectly styled blonde hair hung in greasy, tangled ropes. Her face was gaunt, stripped bare of all her expensive makeup.
She was facing fifteen years in a federal penitentiary for kidnapping and drugging Jocelyn. The judge had denied bail.
Sitting on the other side of the glass was Kieran Douglas.
He looked just as ruined as she did, still wearing the wrinkled suit from the day before. After two days of alcohol-fueled despair, his agony had curdled into a solid, venomous core of pure hatred. He had lost everything, and he had decided that the woman who had struck the first match — the one that burned down his entire world — would feel the full weight of his wrath.
Aspen picked up the heavy black telephone receiver. Her hands were shaking. Kieran had called in the last favor owed to the Douglas name, pulling strings he didn’t even know he had just to secure this single, pre-hearing visit.
“Kieran,” Aspen sobbed, pressing her palm flat against the glass. “You have to get me out of here. Call your family’s lawyers. Tell them I did it all for you — I was trying to protect you from Jocelyn p>
Kieran stared at her. There was no love in his eyes. No pity. Only a cold, venomous hatred.
He picked up his receiver.