Chapter 326:
The shop manager rushed over, looking terrified. “Ms. Vance! Oh my god!”
Zoe froze. A flicker of recognition crossed her face, followed immediately by a sneer of disdain. “Vance? Oh, I know who you are. The ‘Kensington Heiress’ from the news.” She laughed again, a cruel, bubbling sound. “Or should I say, the trailer park princess who got lucky? Just because you have the name doesn’t mean you belong here, sweetie. You still smell like the Bronx.”
Aurora stopped the manager with a raised hand. She looked down at the stain, then up at Zoe. Her expression didn’t change. It was the calm before a tsunami.
“You seem to know a lot about me,” Aurora said, stepping closer, the smell of coffee and ozone radiating from her. “And I know who you are. You’re dating Xavier Sterling.”
Zoe blinked. “How do you know that? Are you stalking him?”
“I know,” Aurora continued, ignoring the accusation, “because the Sterling family values manners above all else. And you, my dear, are a walking etiquette violation.”
“Do you know who I am?” Zoe puffed up her chest. “I saved Xavier’s life! I pulled him out of a burning car in Paris! I am a hero!”
Aurora’s eyes darkened.
Paris. Last autumn. The Aston Martin.
She remembered the heat. The smell of burning rubber. The man screaming in the driver’s seat. She had dragged him out, her hands blistering, and left him on the curb before the sirens arrived because she was on a covert op for Phoenix Logistics. She had told everyone she was at a spa retreat in the Swiss Alps, but in reality, she was extracting a defector near the Rue de Rivoli. She never saw the driver’s face clearly.
She didn’t know it was Xavier.
And she certainly didn’t know this clown was taking credit for it.
“You saved him?” Aurora asked softly. “Interesting.”
𝓕𝓲𝓻𝓼𝓽 𝓾𝓹𝓵𝓸𝓪𝓭: gⲁⳑ𝗇𝗈ν𝖊𝗅𝘀⍰𝓬𝓸𝓶
“Yes!” Zoe bragged. “So back off, or I’ll have Xavier ban you from every store in New York.”
Aurora signaled the bodyguard standing by the door. He stepped forward, blocking Zoe’s exit. Aurora picked up a dress from the display table. A hand-beaded gown worth twelve thousand dollars.
She used it to wipe the coffee off her blouse, smearing the brown stain all over the exquisite beadwork.
She tossed the ruined dress to Zoe. Zoe caught it reflexively.
“You bought this too,” Aurora said, her voice ice cold. “Add it to Xavier’s tab. And tell him… his cousin says hello.”
She yanked the scarf from Zoe’s frozen hand and walked out.
Zoe stood there, clutching the ruined dress, her mouth open.
“Cousin?”
The memory faded as the aircraft engines began to whine. Aurora looked at the back of Zoe’s head in seat 1B. Xavier was beside her in 1A.
She remembered sitting in the café across from Bergdorf’s right after the incident, fuming.
“She’s a fraud,” Aurora had said, sitting in a café across the street. She had changed into a fresh shirt brought by her assistant.
.
.
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