Chapter 82
Chapter 82:
Alycia’s face drained of all color. Her entire plan — to sleep with him, to fake a pregnancy, to secure her place as the Compton matriarch — shattered into pieces.
Cole turned and walked out of the bedroom, pulling the door shut and locking himself in the outer living room.
Alycia sank to the floor. Her fingers dug into the expensive carpet. The manufactured tears stopped. Her eyes narrowed into a dark, venomous glare.
Cole was slipping away. June was winning.
𝗧𝗁е 𝗯𝖾s𝘁 rе𝘢𝘥іn𝗴 ех𝘱е𝗿𝘪eոс𝗲 𝗈𝗻
Alycia reached for her phone on the nightstand and opened her contacts. If she couldn’t have Cole through seduction, she would have to destroy June so completely that he’d have no choice but to throw her away.
It was seven in the morning.
June sat on the edge of the velvet sofa in the Emerald Cove penthouse suite, staring out the floor-to-ceiling windows at the crashing gray waves. She hadn’t slept for a single second.
Her phone screen lit up on the glass coffee table.
A multimedia message from an unknown number.
June picked it up and tapped the screen. A dark, poorly lit photograph filled the display. A hotel bed. Red rose petals scattered across white sheets. Cole’s side profile buried in the pillows. Alycia’s bare shoulder visible in the foreground, her body pressed intimately against his.
A second later, a text arrived from Alycia’s actual number.
“Oh my god, June, I’m so sorry. My hand slipped. I meant to send that to my private group chat. Please delete it p>
June stared at the glowing screen. She didn’t cry. Her tear ducts were completely dry.
Instead, a violent wave of nausea rose in her throat. Her stomach cramped so hard she had to lean forward.
She took a slow, deep breath to keep from being sick. Then her analytical mind took over.
June had spent ten years staring at microscopic cellular structures. Her eyes were trained to see what others missed. She studied the edge of Cole’s jawline carefully. The lighting was wrong — the shadows on his neck didn’t match the angle of the bedside lamp reflected in Alycia’s shoulder. The pixels around the rose petals were blurred and jagged.
A cheap, rushed Photoshop job.
But the fake photo didn’t matter. What mattered was the reality of last night. Cole had left her bleeding and burning on the restaurant floor to carry that woman away.
June pressed the power button. The screen went black.
She walked into the bathroom and stopped in front of the marble vanity.
Sitting beside the sink was the heavy black porcelain jar — no label. The custom burn ointment Cole had pressed onto her skin the night before.
June looked at it. It represented everything toxic about him. He broke her, and then expected her gratitude when he handed her a bandage.
She picked it up, crossed to the metal trash can by the coffee maker, and dropped it in without hesitation.
The heavy porcelain struck the bottom with a sharp crack and shattered into three pieces. The expensive, custom-made white cream splattered out and mixed instantly with a pile of wet, discarded coffee grounds.
Ruined. Exactly where it belonged.