Chapter 427
As the Pierce family heir, Calvin dominated every spotlight he entered. Denied access to Emily, Calvin engineered a trap. He leaked rumors of Pierce-Harper collaboration, triggering an immediate media stampede.
Calvin stood poised before the lenses, a polished, aristocratic smile fixed as he readied rehearsed remarks.
Suddenly, a man erupted from the crowd, shrieking, “You home-wrecking bastard. This is for seducing my wife!
Before the crowd could react, the man lunged, hurling a basin of reeking pig’s blood. The viscous torrent drenched Calvin, scaling his suit to his skin and masking his face.
Silence, thick and stunned, descended.
Then the assailant jabbed a finger at Calvin’s dripping face, bellowing, “Twenty years of marriage. We were happy until you slithered in and seduced her. Now she’s divorcing me.” He spat, “You vile, home-wrecking bastard. You will rot in hell!”
The accusations were like gasoline on a fire. The scene exploded into chaos.
Calvin stood petrified, staring at the gore gluing fabric to flesh.
Frank swayed. He knew Calvin’s pathological neatness. Now violated globally on live streams, it would drive Calvin crazy. The assistant recoiled, dreading the seismic rage beneath the gore.
The man continued his tirade. “Filthy homewrecker! Consider that blood your sinner’s baptism,” he sneered. “If you crave married women so badly, why not just sell yourself on the streets?”
The journalists finally snapped out of their daze. They quickly grabbed their cameras to document the scene. Some of them even went live.
The man said he’d been married for over twenty years. Onlookers did quick math: 20-year marriage meant a wife in her 40s. Calvin was mid-20s.
‘He seduced a woman twice his age?’ The scandalous implication fueled the frenzy. Lenses zoomed in, devouring every twitch of his blood-caked face.
After an eternity, Calvin snapped. Hands trembling grotesquely, he leveled a murderous glare. “You’re dead.” He lunged for a tumbler, smashed it against the table, and surged up-a blood-masked predator.
Calvin’s beauty once tempered his rage. But now, blood-masked with only furious eyes and bared teeth visible, he looked demonic. People recoiled. Even his accuser faltered, bravado evaporating.
Just then, Frank intercepted him, whispering urgently, “The whole world is watching online. Let’s get out of here and clean up first.” He signaled bodyguards. They shield-walled and hauled him away.
Despite the tight escort, every humiliating second was captured. Within thirty minutes, the incident had blown up online. Memes and deepfake parodies spread like wildfire, making Calvin an infamous sensation.
Calvin emerged from bathroom hours later, skin abraded from scrubbing. Frank stood rigid, tablet clutched like ordnance.
Dread spiked in Calvin. He hurried over and snatched the tablet right out of Frank’s hands. And just his luck-the video playing was a looped, mocking edit of his blood-drenched rage.
Calvin’s face contorted. He slammed the tablet onto the floor with a bang, shattering it, but it did nothing to cool his fury.
1/2
Chapter 427
Decades of privilege had never prepared him for this global disgrace. “Who pulled the strings?” he roared, voice fraying. Ill
END them!”
Frank knew this coming, so he had asked someone to investigate. “Sir, digital trails suggest Austin.” He lowered his head. avoiding meeting Calvin’s murderous gaze.
Calvin wasn’t surprised. An icy laugh escaped him. “That bastard. Only he would dare. He’ll repay this humiliation tenfold.” Frank kept his head down, withholding the bitter truth: even though they’d traced it to Austin, evidence was nonexistent. And the revelation was likely Austin’s deliberate taunt-untraceable, deniable, designed to maximize fury.
Of course, he wasn’t about to tell Calvin any of this right now. Otherwise, he’d just be pouring fuel on the fire.
Austin was indeed the architect. Seeing the viral edits, he paid to amplify them. Money was the last thing he cared about now. However much Calvin spent trying to kill the buzz, he’d spend just as much, or even more, making sure it stayed hot.
The whole thing was already wild enough, and the way the topic kept popping up and vanishing across different platforms only made gossip-hungry netizens even more eager to watch the drama unfold.
The scandal permeated even Emily’s offline bubble. She needed no details to recognize Austin’s signature ruthlessness. As he emerged from their kitchen bearing steaming dishes, she arched a brow. “What happened?”
Even though they were living in a spacious house now and had enough money to hire housekeepers, Austin insisted on cooking for her daily, a ritual Emily cherished.
She always finished every bite of the meals he made for her. To them, this is just pure warm and fuzzy joy, like a cozy hug for the soul.
Austin set down the dish, shed his apron, and slid beside her, eyes glinting. “Guess.”
Though Emily had verbalized St. Gabriel Reform Academy’s horrors, she was still carrying a lot of that pain inside. He saw this shared vengeance as therapy, a way to exorcise her inner anguish.
