My Ex Stole My Life Savings To Marry A Billionaire — Until A Vampire King Stepped In
Part 2
The final note of the waltz hung in the air, echoing through the cavernous expanse of the Waldorf-Astoria.
For a moment, nobody moved.
The elite of New York society were completely paralyzed.
Their champagne flutes were suspended halfway to their mouths in sheer disbelief.
Henrik did not release me immediately.
He let the silence stretch, his large, ice-cold hand resting firmly against my spine.
He anchored me to the marble floor, radiating an unnatural power.
When he finally stepped back, the loss of his imposing presence made me shiver.
He offered his arm, and I slid my hand through the crook of his elbow.
His bicep felt like a block of carved marble beneath the fine wool of his tuxedo.
We turned to make our exit, but the path was suddenly blocked by Craig Kensington.
The silver-haired titan of industry stepped directly into Henrik’s path, his red face betraying rising panic.
He attempted to project an authority he clearly did not feel, demanding to discuss business.
Henrik did not stop.
He simply slowed his pace, forcing Craig to physically step backward or be trampled.
Henrik stated calmly that he did not discuss business at social events, nor with failing enterprises.
He revealed to the entire room that he had bought their massive, over-leveraged debt yesterday.
Heather hissed at me, claiming I was ruining her wedding day out of pathetic jealousy.
Dan finally stepped forward with that familiar look of condescension, telling me to stop making a scene and go home.
Before I could defend myself, Henrik shifted his stance.
The predatory menace rolling off him was so palpable that Dan physically recoiled.
Henrik called Dan a coward and a parasite.
He declared I was merely leaving a graveyard before the corpses realized they were dead.
We walked out into the crisp night air, surrounded by blinding paparazzi flashes.
A sleek, midnight-black Maybach S-Class idled at the curb.
The heavy doors closed, plunging us into sudden, intimate silence.
I turned to him in the dim light, demanding to know what he really was.
I told him I felt his chest when we danced, how he didn’t breathe normally, how his eyes glowed in the dark.
He slowly turned his head, the golden hue of his irises undeniable.
He confirmed my most ridiculous, terrifying suspicion.
He was a vampire king, the head of a bloodline that had ruled for nine centuries.
He explained that his ancestors had entrusted a vital subterranean estate in Europe to a proxy family.
That land eventually fell into the hands of Kensington Global.
He had been systematically dismantling their empire to reclaim his ancestral home.
But there was a complication.
To hide the estate in a blind trust, Dan had embezzled the forty-seven thousand dollars from our joint savings account.
Dan had used the money I saved from waitressing double shifts to fund his own betrayal.
To execute the legal maneuver, Dan had forged my signature.
He inadvertently made me the primary legal signatory to the most valuable vampiric asset in the northern hemisphere.
The Kensingtons couldn’t sell it without my signature, and Henrik couldn’t seize it without my consent.
I looked at the forged signature on the documents, then into his glowing ancient eyes, and asked the only question that mattered: ‘How do we destroy him?’
