All Chapters of Shattered Mask: Chapter 101
- Chapter 110
144 chapters
CHAPTER 101
NEMESIS OF A PRINCESSThe rhythmic vibration of the bus against the asphalt was the only thing keeping Leslie grounded as her mind raced through the cold mathematics of her new existence. She leaned her head back, her eyes tracing the frayed edges of the seat in front of her.At least she had a job.That thought was a small, flickering candle in the dark. In two weeks, she would receive a pay cheque. It would not be a fortune; it would not even cover the cost of a single pair of shoes she used to buy on a whim, but it would be hers. It would be a shield against her mother’s relentless, razor-sharp scoldings. Linda’s voice had become a permanent soundtrack of disappointment in the house, and the prospect of being able to say, “I have my own money,” was the only thing keeping Leslie’s pride from completely disintegrating.But as the bus lurched through the evening traffic, the candle of hope began to flicker and dim under the weight of reality.She opened her designer purse and peer
CHAPTER 102
The heavy front door of the Smith mansion swung open. Leslie stumbled into the lobby, her movements unsteady and uncoordinated. The beauty of the marble floors and the soaring ceilings, which had once felt like a natural extension of her own skin, now felt mocking. She was a trespasser in her own home, a woman stained by the sweat of a grocery store stockroom, standing in a shrine of dying comfort.Bernard was there, pacing the rug like a caged animal. The moment he saw her, his face contorted with a mixture of relief and venomous irritation."Where have you been?" he demanded, his voice echoing sharply against the cold walls. "I have been calling you for hours. I was stranded in the district, Leslie. I had to take the bus back like a wanderer because you completely vanished. Do you have any idea what it’s like out there? I thought you had abandoned me."Leslie did not even have the energy to look him in the eye. The argument she usually would have mounted died before it reached h
CHAPTER 103
The stairs felt longer on the way down, each step vibrating through Leslie’s swollen ankles. The weight of the document in her hand seemed odd compared to its actual mass. To Leslie, this was just the paperwork of a failed chapter, the legal obituary of her life with a man who had been a footnote in her family’s grand narrative. She could not fathom why Linda, a woman who dealt in multi-million-dollar mergers and high-stakes social engineering, would care about a repairman’s exit strategy.When she reached the ground floor, Linda was not there. The sharp, savoury scent of searing meat and onions wafted from the kitchen, a domestic smell that felt alien in a house that usually smelt of expensive lilies and floor wax. Linda had vanished back into the kitchen.Leslie slumped onto the sofa next to Bernard, tossing the folder onto the coffee table. She leaned her head back, closing her eyes. "Why does she want this so badly? It is just Jack’s divorce papers. There is nothing in there b
CHAPTER 104
HEIST FOR A LOOPHOLELinda sat on the couch, her posture rigid, though her eyes betrayed a deep, persistent fatigue. For the last half hour, she had been a woman possessed. She had pored over the blue-bound divorce folder with the intensity of a diamond cutter, her finger tracing every line, every comma, every dry legal citation.By the time she had reached the fourth page, a cold, frustrated sweat had broken out on her brow. She was looking for a ghost. She was looking for a name, Vantage, Rothwell, Investment Group, anything that would tie up Jack, the man who used to fix their leaky faucets, to the financial titan that had just gutted their lives.But the pages yielded nothing but the monotonous drone of standard legal proceedings. It was the regular stuff: the dissolution of the domestic partnership, the mutual waiver of alimony, the standard division of personal property. Jack had claimed his clothes, his tools, and a modest sum of savings he had brought into the marriage. It
CHAPTER 105
TABLE OF DISBELIEFLinda looked up from her plate, her eyes hard and judgmental. The sight of him, sweaty, dishevelled, and smelling of exhaust and pavement, seemed to offend her more than their actual poverty."You are finally home," she commented, her voice clipped. It was not a welcome; it was an observation of his tardiness.Robert nodded, his chest still rising and falling in shallow, jagged bursts. He reached for a glass of water, draining it in a single, desperate gulp before wiping his mouth with the back of his hand."Did you finally get a job?" Linda asked, her tone flat. "Or are we adding another mouth to feed to the list of our failures?" She asked"I got one," Robert wheezed, his voice cracking. "Valet. At the high-rise on 5th. It is a week’s trial. I have to prove I can handle the volume and the... the regular customers before they put me on the permanent roster. It is back-breaking, Linda. I am on my feet for ten hours, sprinting for keys, and driving cars that I us
CHAPTER 106
DILEMMA OF THE FAMILYLinda paused, her fork hovering over her plate. The laughter had died down, replaced by a cold, prickling sensation at the back of her neck. She thought about the fifth page of the document, the standard "No-Fault" clauses. She thought about Jack’s silent, unblinking departure. She thought about how the Vantage Group had pulled out the very week the divorce was finalised."It is impossible," Linda whispered, though the conviction in her voice was wavering. "The Rothwell family is old money. They are ghosts. They don't spend three years living in a suburb, fixing sinks and taking insults from people like us.""That is exactly why he did it," Robert countered. "Where better to hide than in the one place nobody would ever look for a king? In the shadow of a family so blinded by their own vanity that they could not see the man standing right in front of them."Robert reached out and grabbed a piece of bread, but he didn't eat it. He just gripped it until it crumbl
CHAPTER 107
WHO IS HE ?Robert ignored Bernard and turned his gaze toward Linda. He looked like a man who had seen a ghost and was now realising the ghost was the one holding the keys to the house."Who was he, Linda?" Robert asked, his voice suddenly quiet and terrifyingly focused. "Do we actually know anything about Jack’s family? Does anyone here know where he actually came from?" Robert asked them, glancing at their faces one after the other, waiting for an answer.The table went silent. The only sound was the clinking of Leslie’s spoon against her bowl as she scraped the last of the stew. Linda looked away, her eyes drifting toward the darkened foyer where the portrait of Arthur Smith still hung, a silent sentinel of
CHAPTER 108
The rhythmic clink of Leslie’s spoon against her bowl had stopped. Even Bernard, who usually found a way to fill the tension with a sarcastic remark or a complaint about the food, was frozen, his bread halfway to his mouth.Robert was the one to break the spell. He pushed his plate away, the stew untouched, and leaned onto the table. His eyes, bloodshot from the day’s labour and the evening’s revelations, were fixed on Linda."Think back, Linda," Robert said, his voice dropping into a low, urgent tone. "Think about the day he arrived. You said Arthur brought him. You said he was the son of an important friend. But Arthur didn't have a wide circle. He was a man of business, a man of power. He didn't waste time on sentimentality. Who, in Arthur’s life, was important enough to warrant a three-year marriage contract for his daughter?" Robert asked. He wore the face of all the seriousness he could gatherLinda tightened her grip on her water glass, her knuckles turning a waxy white. Sh
CHAPTER 109
Leslie was the first to reach there. She leaned over and her eyes immediately fell on what Linda’s hand was hovering on, and pausedLinda’s breath hitched. A cold, numbing sensation started at her toes and raced up her spine. She realised why Arthur had been so insistent. She realised why the Vantage Group had waited until the ink was dry on this paper to strike. She realised why Julian Rothwell had been so interested in their family."Linda?" Robert asked, standing up. "What is it? What does it say?"Linda didn't answer. She couldn't. She stared at the name, the name they had never bothered to ask for, the name they had ignored because they thought it didn't matter.Leslie was the first to reach there. She leaned over and her eyes immediately fell on what Linda’s hand was hovering on, and paused"Jack is a Rothwell?" She screamed.“Jack Rothwell.” She murmured the full name out loudThe document slipped from her fingers and fluttered to the floor, landing face-up on the rug."The f
CHAPTER 110
UNKNOWN MOTIVATION"I can understand a man having money. What I cannot understand is the motivation. Why would Jack, the son of Julian Rothwell, a man who could have had any woman in the world, any position, any life, decide to act as a repairman? Why would he marry into a family like ours just to spend three years fixing sinks and taking insults? What was the prize?" Linda asked in confusionShe turned back to the room, her gaze sweeping over her children and Robert. "A man of that stature does not just play dress-up for the fun of it. Was it a test from his father? Was he hiding from something? Or was he looking for something in us that we simply didn't have? He chose to play a peasant to marry