THE KASTELLAN HEIR.

REPOSSESSION.

Nobody breathed.

The wind moved through the roses. Somewhere in the manor, a distant alarm chirped and went quiet. Ronan walked down the center of the aisle with unhurried steps, Sienna a pace behind him, and the crowd parted before them like water.

Preston recovered first.

"You!" He surged forward, his face suffused with rage. "Security! Somebody throw this man out! He's trespassing! He's drunk, he's..."

"The security you're calling for," Ronan said mildly, "works for me."

He nodded to Pruitt, who trotted forward from the manor doors, clutching a folder to his chest like a shield.

"Sir. All staff have received the closure notice," Pruitt said in a trembling voice. "The catering has been stopped. The band has been paid and dismissed."

"Thank you, Mr. Pruitt."

"Wait." Preston's voice cracked upward. "Closed? Paid? Who are you?"

Ronan let the question hang. When he spoke again, he addressed the crowd, in the tone of a man reading the minutes of a meeting.

"My name is Ronan Kastellan. As of Wednesday of this week, the Green Hills Manor Events Group, including this estate, its grounds, its staff, its equipment, and every contract signed with it, is a subsidiary of Kastellan Global Holdings. Which I chair."

A gasp swept through the garden.

"Kastellan?" someone whispered. "TheKastellans?"

"That can't be right. The old man died childless."

"They said there was an heir, but nobody knew..."

Margaux was on her feet, screeching. "This is a lie! It's a cheap trick! Ronan Kastellan, you're a nobody, an orphan, a leech! You're lying!"

Ronan turned his gaze on her. It was the same look she'd given him across a desk, but reversed.

"Mrs. Brentford," he said. "Would you like to see my card?"

He took the black-and-gold card from his pocket and held it up so that it flashed in the afternoon light. A murmur rolled through the crowd. A few men in expensive suits pulled out their phones, thumbs flying.

"It's on the news!" someone shouted. "Kastellan Group's announced a new Chairman. There's a photo! It's him!"

Coleman lurched to his feet, staring, his big jaw hanging slack.

"That's impossible," he croaked. "I saw you get into that limo. I told Mom..."

"You did," Ronan agreed. "And she called you a fool. It seems she owes you an apology."

Preston's fingers were trembling at his sides. Vivienne stood frozen beside him, her hand pressed to her mouth, the tulle veil fluttering against her cheek. She looked at Ronan as though seeing him for the first time.

"You," she whispered. "It was you. The boutique. The bill."

"Sixty-four thousand dollars," Ronan said. "A wedding gift."

"But why?"

"So it would be mine."

He gestured toward the line of black-suited staff standing at the edge of the lawn. At a nod, a small team of boutique workers in white gloves stepped forward. One carried a garment bag. Another carried a clipboard.

"Mr. Halvane," said the woman with the clipboard, "we're here from Rosalind's Bridal Atelier, a Kastellan subsidiary. Per the outstanding purchase agreement, ownership of the merchandise remains with the store until the customer's account is settled."

"It was paid!" Preston shouted. "It was paid in full!"

"By Mr. Kastellan. Which means the items are his property." She smiled apologetically. "He has asked that they be returned. Effective immediately."

She turned to Vivienne. "Ma'am, we'll need the dress."

For a moment, nobody understood.

Then a cold, sick horror filled Vivienne's face. "Here? Now?"

"There is a changing tent behind the arch. We'd be glad to give you a robe."

"You can't be serious." Her voice was a thin thread. "This is my wedding. Ronan. Ronan.Please. You can't."

He looked at her.

Her eyes were wet. Her lip was trembling. And for the length of one long breath, he saw the woman he'd loved for four years, the woman who'd once fallen asleep on his shoulder during a thunderstorm and murmured his name.

Then he remembered a cold hand on his desk. A slammed door. Your junk isn't here anymore, Ronan. Not one thing that's yours remains in this house.

"Twenty-four years of my life went into a dumpster for this ceremony," he said softly. "I'm only asking for the dress."

The crowd murmured. Somewhere, a woman started to cry.

"And the suits," Sienna added, from beside him. She held up another folder. "Mr. Halvane's tailoring was purchased through the same account. The best man's, too, and the groomsmen's."

"What?" the best man squawked.

"The limousines," Sienna continued calmly, "were leased from a Kastellan fleet company. The florist. The catering. The photographer's equipment. The jewelry." She glanced at Vivienne's hand. "The ring is being examined by our team, but we suspect it was purchased on the same credit line."

Preston's face was purple. "You set us up.You planned this!"

"I gave you an invitation," Ronan said. "You gave me an address. Everything else, you did to yourselves."

The next ten minutes were chaos.

Guests started leaving in a nervous rush, the whispers rising to gossip, gossip to a roar. Phones went up. Cameras clicked. On the lawn, staff calmly dismantled the wedding arch, the flowers, the white chairs. A team of guards took position beside the limousines, and drivers stepped out, tipped their caps to Ronan, and drove away with the empty cars.

Vivienne was led, weeping, into the tent. Margaux screamed at anyone who came near. Coleman, red-faced, lunged at Ronan with a fist the size of a ham. He got three steps.

Two guards seized him. Coleman howled and twisted, but they pinned him against the arch.

"Let me go! You piece of trash, you parasite!"

"That word again," Ronan said, and he almost smiled. "It isn't quite as convincing coming from a man in a rented tuxedo."

Then he turned to Preston.

The groom stood alone in the aisle now, stripped of his jacket, his cufflinks, his shoes. He looked small in his shirtsleeves, hair mussed, eyes bloodshot. Around him, the guests' faces showed pity, contempt, curiosity.

"I want everyone to hear this," Ronan said, and raised his voice. "Preston Halvane is not a wealthy man. He's a thief. For fourteen months, he has been embezzling from Brentford Design, taking money from Vivienne's grandfather's legacy. And for longer than that, he has been sleeping with a married woman."

A shocked gasp.

"That's slander!" Preston shrieked.

"I have the bank statements," Ronan said. "And the hotel receipts. And the text messages you sent my wife from my own office. Would you like me to read them aloud?"

Sienna handed him a tablet. On the giant screen behind the altar, which had flickered back to life at a signal, an image appeared: the first of a long series of bank records, stamped and dated, with a name at the bottom.

P. Halvane.

The crowd's reaction was a wave of sound. Some guests recoiled. Others laughed in stunned disbelief. A man in the third row was already on his phone, calling someone. Ronan wondered idly if it was a lawyer or a reporter.

The third row.

He turned.

The seat by the aisle was empty.

"Sienna," he said quietly. "Where's Crane?"

She scanned the crowd, and her expression sharpened. "He left. Sometime in the last five minutes."

"Left with what?"

Before she could answer, her earpiece crackled. She listened, and her whole body went rigid.

"Say that again."

Her hand tightened on the tablet. Ronan had seen her handle a shooter, a board of vultures, a hundred-million-dollar deal. He had never seen her frightened.

"It's the estate," she said slowly. "Ronan, it's Emeric."

"What about him?"

"He's collapsed. They can't wake him."