A Bride's Last Secret

CHAPTER 1

(The Water Glass)

The bridal suite shimmered with gold and ivory, but the air inside was heavy, suffocating.

“You'll wrinkle my dress if you stand there breathing like that.”

Lauren Lancaster's voice, sharp and honeyed all at once, sliced through the Belmont Hotel's penthouse.

She stood before the gilded mirror, her reflection glowing in ivory satin. The gown clung to her curves like second skin, pearls glittering along the bodice.

To anyone she looked like an exquisite dream though to her younger sister Anna, she had always been a nightmare.

Anna opened her mouth to reply, but Lauren silenced her with a glare.

“You were,” Lauren continued, her painted lips curving into a cruel smile.

“Don't argue. Do you know what it feels like, Anna? To be chosen? To walk into a church where the world will rise for you? To marry a man who could buy and sell your entire existence with a flick of his pen?”

The words pressed down on Anna like stones. She kept her head bowed, clutching the hem of her plain blue dress.

“Congratulations,” she whispered, though the word tasted like ash.

Lauren laughed softly, a hollow sound.

“Congratulations? That's all? I suppose it must hurt doesn't it? To be nothing more than Dad's shame, dragged along like a servant while I become Mrs William Fairchild.”

The name alone seemed to darken the room. William Fairchild… the elusive billionaire, thirty four, towering with a presence so cold it seemed carved from stone. His eyes, black as midnight, held no warmth.

Anna has seen him only twice, and each time his gaze had passed through her as though she were invisible.

“You'll be happy with him,” Anna managed.

“Happiness is irrelevant. Power is what matters,” Lauren replied smoothly. “And I'll have it. You, however…” she let her eyes rake over her sister, cruel and dismissive. “...will always be the reminder of Dad's filthy mistake. Don't forget your place.”

Her words left Anna raw. She was the product of an affair, a bastard draped in the Lancaster name only by pity. Lauren never lets her forget.

With a flick of manicured fingers, Lauren dismissed her.

“Fetch me some water. I wouldn't want to faint at the altar. Imagine the headlines.”

Anna bit back the sting of humiliation and obeyed. She crossed the silent doorway, as her mind screamed to rebel, to hurl the request back, but her body moved as it always had… trained to obey.

The errand took less than two minutes, but when she returned, glass trembling in her hand… the bridal suite was unnervingly quiet.

Had her friends left already? She thought.

“Lauren?”

No answer.

Her pulse stuttered as she stepped toward the adjoining bath.

And there in the claw foot tub, lay Lauren.

Her pristine dress was soaked, clinging to her like a shroud. Her wrists had been slit wide open like ribbons, scarlet bleeding into the water. Her golden curls clung to porcelain, her bright, cruel eyes glassy and still.

The glass slipped from Anna's hands and shattered.

“No…no, Lauren!” she cried, stumbling forward. She fell to her knees beside the tub, shaking hands grasping at her sister's shoulders, desperate for breath, for a blink, for a sneer…anything.

But there was nothing.

Lauren Lancaster was dead.

Tears spilled down her cheeks as sobs tore out of her chest. For all of Lauren's cruelty, she was still her sister. The only sister she had. And she had died before her eyes.

Suddenly the door burst open.

Mr Lancaster's voice roared. “What is this—” before collapsing into silence. His wife Anna's step mother Margaret, shrieked and covered her mouth.

The Fairchilds, the groom's powerful family, crowded into the room within seconds.

Mr Fairchild's eyes hardened into ice as he took in the scene.

William Fairchild himself in a black tuxedo sharp as a blade, stepped forward. He towered over the graphic image before him, his jaw tight, his expression unreadable. His obsidian gaze swept over Lauren's cold lifeless body, then landed on Anna, kneeling, trembling, her hands stained with blood.

Margaret's horrified scream split the air for the second time. “What did you do?!”

Her palm cracked across Anna's face before the girl could speak.

“You vile, cursed child! This is all your fault! You brought this upon us!”

“I—I didn't—” Anna stammered, shaking her head, her voice breaking. “I found her—”

“She lies,” Margaret spat, turning to the Fairchilds. “She has always envied Lauren. Always.”

The room erupted. Mr Lancaster tried to speak but his voice drowned beneath overlapping accusations, as Margaret shot him with a razor sharp glare.

Katherine Fairchild clutched her pearls so tightly, her knuckles turned white. Helena Fairchild whispered something vicious into her brother's ear, though his expression never changed.

Servants lingered in the doorway, wide eyed, and then quickly scattered at Margaret's voice as though their mere glancing could cost them dearly.

William Fairchild stood unmoving, like a statue, his eyes never leaving Anna. His father muttered curses under his breath, each one heavier than the last.

The smell of perfume and blood tangled in the air until Anna could barely breathe.

Helena let out a cold laugh.

“How poetic,” she sneered. “The bastard girl found covered in the bride's blood. What will the papers say when they find out?”

Anna's knees threatened to give way. Her hands still wet with her sister's blood, shook violently.

A part of her wanted to scream until the walls shook, but another part… trained for years to endure humiliation… kept her throat closed.

“This cannot get out,” Mr Fairchild snapped. “The press is outside. Investors. Guests. A scandal like this will destroy us all,”

Mr Lancaster's voice cut through the chaos. “There will be no scandal. No whispers. No blood in the headlines,”

“How do you intend to achieve that?” Katherine asked.

“The families depend on this union,” Mr Fairchild countered sharply. “Fairchild Enterprises will not bleed reputation and billions. Not over one girl's recklessness,”

Helena scoffed. “And what do you propose, Father? The guests are waiting—”

“The wedding will go on,” Margaret Lancaster declared. Her words were final, merciless. Her eyes locked on Anna. “She'll take her sister's place.”

The room once fell into silence.

Anna's breath hitched. “No. No I can't—”

“You can and you will.” Margaret's tone was ice. “Our empire depends on this day. My dear daughter may be dead, but the ceremony must proceed. And the world would never know.”

Anna looked to her father, silently pleading with him with her eyes.

She was hoping that once… just this once he'd stand up for her and protect her from her step mother's cruelty.

But Mr Lancaster's face twisted with shame, and he said nothing.

Her father's haunting silence has just sealed her fate… maybe for eternity.

Helena's lips curled in triumph at Anna's horror, as though she'd been waiting her whole life for this downfall.

The girl shook her head, tears falling freely. “Please… don't do this.”

But her step mother’s decree feels like a sentence of doom.

“You will marry William Fairchild. Today.”

And in that moment, as William's cold eyes locked on hers, Anna realized she had not only lost her sister… she has lost her freedom.

Her fate was sealed. In blood. In silence. In chains she could never escape. And outside those golden doors, an entire world waited for a bride who would never walk again.

And with that Anna Marie Lancaster's fate was sealed… in blood and silence.