His face—God, his face—was a violent maelstrom of agony, raw emotion splashing across his features until, suddenly, it was gone. Wiped clean in a split second, like it had never existed.
He spun on his heels and ran, leaving a wake of devastation behind him. He ran from me. From the lie. From the truth he’d begged for, but I’d been too weak and broken to tell him.
“Sin!” I shouted, my voice hoarse, pleading, already halfway out of my chair.
He didn’t look back. But his steps faltered. He almost stopped, and my heart skipped a beat in hope, but he didn’t. He ran like the mouth of hell had opened up.
My chair crashed to the floor. A brutal sound in the vacuum left behind. All eyes turned to me. The next spectacle. Their expectation was palpable. Suffocating.
My father’s face twisted into a look of disgust. Fury cloaked in decorum. “Sit. The fuck. Down.” He took a step toward me, his voice low and lethal.
That voice used to freeze me in place. Used to cage me. But not tonight. Not now. Never a-fucking-gain. Something clicked into place inside me. Crystal. Sharp. Final.
I didn’t care about the Astor legacy. The empire. The billions. I didn’t care about any of it. Becausehehad just run out that door, and he was all that mattered.
“No.” My voice didn’t shake. I straightened my spine and pulled my shoulders back. Looked the monster in the square in the eye.
My father’s eyes narrowed, venomous. “If you don’t do what you’re told, honor your obligations, you’ll loseeverything.”
The crowd held their breath. Cameras clicked like machine guns. Vanity Fair and Forbes had front row seats to the Astor downfall. Let them. Let them watch me walk away. Let them write their headlines.
I. Did. Not. Care.
My world was already burning, and I threw gasoline on the fire.
“No,” I said again, louder this time. “I’m not your pawn.”
He scoffed. A king losing his grip on the board. “You are whatever I make you. You ungrateful?—”
“Not anymore!” My voice cracked like thunder. “It took me thirty-five fucking years, but I’m done. I’m done being your tool. Your project. Your disappointment.”
My hands shook, balled into fists, aching to hit something. Rosalie stood beside me—tall, proud, silent in her support. She stared down at her father the way I did mine. We weren’t heirs anymore. We were rebels.
“I’m gay.”
The room gasped. A collective inhale of horror and scandal. Across the crowd, I saw Thalia’s face light up, her smile like a firework in a pitch black sky. A single nod of pride.
“I’ve always been gay.”
My father went rigid, his face flushed with rage and embarrassment. “How dare you—” he began.
But I was ready to walk away. The kingdom could fall. The family name could rot. The vultures could circle all they wanted, picking apart what remained. All that mattered now wasSinclair.
“Sending me away at fifteen didn’t change a damn thing,” I spat, my voice cracking through the glittering silence. “All it did was teach me how to hate—myself, you, everything I ever believed in. You didn’t make me better. You made me hollow. You carved out every piece of me that didn’t fit your design and left behind something obedient, broken—something you could mold and manipulate at will.”
My father’s face contorted, veins pulsed in his forehead, spit flying from his lips as he snarled, “You wereneverworthy of the Astor name. Of mylegacy.”
I didn’t flinch. Ismiled.Sharp and cruel and soaked in grief. “I don’t want it,” I hissed. “Keep your fucking legacy. I’d rather bedirt poorwith the man I love than live another second crawling through your filth.”
Gasps erupted from the crowd. Champagne glasses slipped through fingers and shattered like the version of me they’d all crafted in their heads. My mother sobbed across the table, wringing her hands on a linen napkin as if she could wipe away the damage.
“Oh, Theodore…” Her voice broke, brittle and raw. “I didn’t know. Ineverknew that’s where he sent you…” Her tear-streaked face twisted with a sudden fury, and she rounded on my father. “How could you do that to your ownchild?!”
He didn’t answer. She’d never spoken to him in that tone before. I shoved past him before he could regain his composure, pushing through the tables as staff scrambled to hold back the stunned guests and predatory reporters. Faces blurred. Flashbulbs went off like gunfire, but I continued like I was marching to war.
Because I was. I was preparing for the fight of my life. I’d lay everything out on the battleground, for just one more chance.
Over my shoulder, I saw Rosalie standing like a storm in the center of it all, her eyes wet and shining. She clutched her chest, mouthing silently: “Go. I’ve got this.”
