Chapter 5 - The Fake Arrangement
By Monday morning, news of the incident in the parking garage had leaked through corporate channels, though the details were heavily distorted. Rumors were flying across the offices of Blackwell & Reed that Adrian Kane was personally protecting senior creative director Elena Vance from a high-stakes stalking threat.
To quell the rampant corporate gossip—and to give me complete legal immunity while the high-conflict divorce proceedings were initiated—Adrian proposed an audacious, dangerous plan.
We were sitting in his office at 8:00 AM.
“A public engagement,” Adrian announced calmly, sliding a thick velvet box across his mahogany desk toward me.
I stared at the box as if it contained a live grenade. “A what?”
“Gregory’s legal team in Atlanta is attempting to file a jurisdictional challenge, claiming you abandoned your marital home and are living an unstable life in New York,” Adrian explained, leaning back in his chair. “If you are publicly engaged to the majority shareholder of Kane Global Holdings, their argument that you lack financial stability or proper security vanishes overnight. It destroys his narrative in court.”
“Adrian, this is insane!” I exclaimed, standing up. “We’re talking about fake news! The press will go wild! The board of directors will think I used my position to manipulate you!”
“The board answers to me,” Adrian said smoothly. He opened the velvet box. Inside sat a flawless six-carat cushion-cut diamond ring, sparkling brilliant ice-blue under the office lights. “And as for the press, let them talk. It serves as a very loud, very public warning to your ex-husband that touching you means declaring war on the Kane family.”
I looked at the ring, then at Adrian. “And what happens when the legal battle is over? How do we explain breaking off an engagement?”
Adrian stood up, walked around the desk, and picked up the ring. He took my hand. His fingers were steady and warm.
“Let’s worry about the ending when we get there, Elena,” he said softly.
He slid the diamond onto my ring finger. It fit perfectly. A strange, electricity-like shock ran up my arm, making my breath hitch.
Just then, the office door swung open without a knock.
A tall, elegant woman in her late fifties, wearing an immaculate white Chanel suit and pearl earrings, stepped into the room. She carried herself with the icy, aristocratic authority of old Manhattan royalty.
It was Eleanor Kane. Adrian’s mother.
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Her eyes flicked from Adrian, to me, and then down to the massive diamond shining on my left hand.
“Adrian,” Eleanor said, her voice dripping with refined disdain. “Care to explain why the New York Post is calling my secretary to ask if my son is marrying a mid-level employee with a child from a failed marriage?”
