The Ring That Sank, The Love That Drowned Chapter 08
Reid sat in the front row and started clapping.
At first, only a few people joined him. Then the
applause spread through the entire room.
I stood beneath the lights, looking at the icy lake.
on the screen behind me.
In my previous life, that water had nearly
swallowed me.
This time, it was finally closing in around them
instead.
The night Spencer took Vivian to the hospital, he
turned around and bought me an entire season’s
worth of Paris couture.
A screenshot of the bill landed on my phone.
The note was only a few words.
[For Natalie. Making it up to her.]
My assistant told me Vivian had originally picked
out that entire collection. She had planned to wear
it for her comeback and return to the international
charity–gala circuit.
For the first time, Spencer hadn’t given her what
she wanted.
He had bought all of it for me instead.
I looked at the note and laughed.
In my previous life, I waited ten years and ended
up with nothing but discarded lace.
Now that I wanted nothing from him, he had finally
learned how to make amends.
My assistant asked, “Ms. Sinclair, should we
return everything?”
“No.”
She froze for a moment.
I set down my phone.
“Resell it. Donate the proceeds to a children’s
drowning–prevention charity, and list Spencer
Vaughn as the donor.”
Half an hour later, the story was everywhere
online.
Spencer called me himself.
“Do you really have to humiliate me like this?”
I asked, “Weren’t they mine to do whatever I
wanted with?”
He had no answer.
From somewhere down the hospital corridor, I
could hear Vivian crying.
“Spencer, forget about me. Go find Natalie. I’m
only making things harder for you.”
Spencer lowered his voice.
“The doctor said the cut isn’t deep. Stop playing
games with your life.”
The other end went quiet.
Vivian probably hadn’t expected him to refuse to
indulge her for once.
But it was only once.
A nurse soon hurried over to say Vivian was
refusing the examination.
Spencer let out a heavy breath.
I didn’t need to see him to know he was about to
go back to her.
Sure enough, he said, “Natalie, I’ll call you later.”
I laughed softly.
“Spencer, look at you. You’re still exactly the
same.”
He said nothing.
“You say you want to make things up to me, but
you can’t even finish one phone call with me.”
“That’s not-”
“Don’t explain.”
I hung up.
Then I called my lawyer.
“Sue Vivian for defamation and business
disparagement, and bring a separate claim based
on her deliberately endangering me at the lake.
Move on all three at once.”
My lawyer paused.
“Vaughn Group may try to pressure us.”
I looked toward the glow of the hospital in the
distance.
“Then go after Vaughn Group too.”
The next day, my lawyer moved to preserve the evidence.
A nurse came forward with a signed statement.
The cut on Vivian’s wrist had been shallow and
self–inflicted before she was admitted.
A recording also captured something Vivian had
said before she was admitted.
“Will this scar? Don’t make it too deep.”
Public opinion completely reversed.
Vivian’s team panicked and sent representatives
to Sinclair Group that same night to negotiate a
settlement.
They pushed an agreement across the table.
“Ms. Sinclair, Ms. Hale is willing to make a public
apology, but you must drop the lawsuits and
acknowledge that the lake video was edited in a
misleading way.”
I flipped to the final page.
The settlement offer was $150,000.
I looked up.
“Her entire career is only worth $150,000?”
The representative’s expression tightened.
“Don’t burn every bridge.”
I smiled.
“I didn’t.”
I fed the agreement into the shredder.
“I kept leaving bridges standing until all I had left
was a scrap of lace cut from someone else’s
dress.”
After they left, Reid came in.
He set a signed statement from the hospital nurse
in front of me.
“Here are the bank records showing Vivian paid off the nurse. And one more thing. The gallery overseas she signed with burned Calloway Group on a deal back then too. I’ve been looking into her
for a long time.”
I looked at him.
“Mr. Calloway, are you this invested because you’re helping me, or because you want another
bite out of Vaughn Group?”
He smiled.
“Both.”
I said nothing.
The smile faded from his face, and his voice grew
more serious.
“But I won’t use you as bait.”
It wasn’t a grand declaration.
But it felt cleaner than every piece of
compensation Spencer had tried to throw at me.