Given to a Beggar: A Marriage's Darkest Secret
After eight years of marriage, Claudia sacrificed her own treatment and gave up her dance career to save Dylan, leaving her with a permanent leg injury-and ultimately becoming a gilded bird confined beneath his wings.
She felt trapped like a cherished, yet confined trophy, enduring the cold intimacy of her husband, unaware that the man she spent blindfolded nights with was a beggar's stand-in. Dylan remained faithful to Nora, his true love suffering from a terminal illness.
Upon becoming pregnant, Claudia stumbled upon the truth. She discovered she had been deceived, and that her unborn child's umbilical cord blood was coveted for its potential life-saving properties. This revelation sparked her awakening.
With her father by her side, she embarked on a path of revenge, exposing Dylan's deception and the dark secrets of his company, leading to the freezing of his assets.
During this journey, Claudia reclaimed her passion for dance, underwent professional rehabilitation, and uncovered the truth behind Nora's feigned illness and her conspiracy to have Dylan harmed in the past.
As Dylan faced betrayal from all sides, his company went bankrupt, and he eventually lost his sanity. Nora ended up in prison, paying the price for her actions.
Claudia not only returned to the stage, shining brighter than ever, but also found unwavering support and true companionship with Greg.
Once deceived and hurt, she broke free from her shackles, experiencing a rebirth and renewal in both her career and personal relationships, opening a new chapter in her life.
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Chapter 3
There were no tears.
No hysterics.
Just a dead, chilling calm inside me, with a single flame of revenge flickering to life.
In the car, I pulled out my phone and dialed a number.
On the other end was Elora Wade, my father's most capable lead investigative journalist.
A woman known in certain circles for being able to "dig up secrets from the dead".
"Elora. It's me, Claudia," I said, my voice unnervingly steady. I want everything on Dylan's stand-in. His background, his family, every single transaction record between him and Dylan. The more detailed, the better."
Elora paused for a few seconds. "Miss, what do you mean by look-alike stand-in?"
I forced a smirk, my tone flat. "Dylan is a narcissistic control freak. He would never tolerate a sloppy imitation. To make sure that beggar could play his part perfectly, Dylan wrote a manual himself. Dozens of pages long.
It detailed everything. Even the private, intimate details of how he thought I should be handled.
The digital copy is in my cloud drive."
Elora's voice took on a new gravity. "Understood, Miss. You'll have everything you need within three days."
I interrupted her. "No, I need you to do one more thing. Inform my father that it's time to act. Start with the smaller stuff. The tax evasion at his company. The intern exploitation scandals. I want him to watch, helpless, as the empire he's so proud of is slowly eaten away from the inside, like termites gnawing at the foundations."
By the time I finished, the car had arrived at the villa, where I'd shared with Dylan.
I didn't return to the bedroom filled with humiliating memories.
Instead, I walked straight to the very back of the house, to a room that had been sealed shut for eight full years.
It was my dance studio.
Eight years had passed since I last set foot in here.
Inside, all the mirrors were covered with thick white cloths.
I walked over and gestured for the cloths to be pulled away, one by one.
The mirrors reflected a stranger.
Her face was pale, her figure frail.
I leaned against the cold bar, slowly lifting my right leg.
At the ankle, there was a grotesque scar, ugly and painful.
I had once felt inferior because of this scar, a constant reminder that I was a cripple.
A cripple that could never stand on stage again.
But now, looking at the wounded version of myself in the mirror, I felt an unprecedented sense of calm.
Dylan destroyed my dance career and my dreams.
But he probably never imagined that he also built for me a larger stage with his own hands.
A stage centered around revenge, with the entire Larson family as its backdrop.
And now, the show was about to begin.