Chapter 3 - The Sins of the Working Class
“You arrogant little trash,” Celeste hissed, taking another step forward until she was nearly nose-to-nose with me.
Gabriel took a half-step forward, his hand extending toward Celeste’s arm. “Celeste, stop this right now. That’s enough.”
“No, Gabriel, it is not enough!” Celeste screamed, swatting his hand away. She turned her full fury back onto me, her voice rising to a shrill, hysterical pitch that filled the grand ballroom. “Look at her! Look at this pathetic nobody! She thinks she has rights in our house? Do you know who her family is, Gabriel? Do you know what kind of gutter trash she crawled out of?”
My hands trembled, not from fear, but from the searing heat of rage burning behind my ribs.
“Leave my family out of this,” I warned, my voice shaking.
“Why should I?!” Celeste shrieked, throwing her hands up in the air. “Everyone here needs to know who you’re bringing into your home, Gabriel! Her mother’s an alcoholic who hasn't held a job since the nineties, and her little brat of a sister—what is her name? Lily? Coughing her lungs out in some dank tenement apartment on welfare checks paid for by our tax dollars!”
The words hit me like physical blows.
Lily. She dragged Lily into this. She used my sick, seven-year-old daughter as a weapon to humiliate me in front of Boston’s elite.
A collective murmur rose from the crowd—not of shock at Celeste’s cruelty, but of smug, comfortable agreement. To them, poverty was a moral failing, a stain that justified any amount of degradation.
“And you,” Celeste sneered, leaning in close, her eyes wide and manic. “You think because Gabriel’s mother gave your family some little charity handout last winter—paying your heating bill like you were stray dogs—that you belong here? You’re nothing. You scrub toilets, you empty trash cans, and the second this party is over, you’re going back to the filth you came from!”
Gabriel’s expression turned to stone. The air around him dropped ten degrees. He moved forward, his voice a lethal whisper. “Celeste. Shut. Up.”
“Don't you dare defend her, Gabriel! She took my bracelet! She’s a thief, just like her—”
Before Celeste could finish the sentence, she lunged forward, her hand clawing toward the silver tray in my arms to knock it to the floor.
Instinct took over.
I stepped back, pulling the tray out of her reach.
Celeste lost her balance, stumbling forward. Frustrated, humiliated, and entirely unhinged, she reached out and grabbed my arm with long, viciously sharp fingernails, digging them deep into my skin.
“Don't touch me,” I said coldly.
I pulled my arm back, snapping my wrist out of her grip with a sharp, clean motion.
Celeste staggered backward, her face twisting in pure disbelief.
Before she could recover, the fury that had been simmering inside her snapped all control. She raised her right hand—and swung.
Slap.
The sound cracked through the marble foyer like a gunshot.
My head snapped to the side. My cheek burned instantly, hot and stinging, the imprint of her rings flashing white against my skin.
The room gasped. Even Senator Vance stepped back, looking genuinely horrified by the physical violence.
Celeste didn't stop. Emboldened by the blow, she screeched like a cornered cat and swung her arm again, aiming straight for my face with her fingernails bared.
This time, I didn't dodge.
As her hand came slicing through the air, my right hand shot out with blinding speed.
I didn't strike her. I didn't squeeze or crush.
I simply caught her wrist.
My fingers locked around her bones with a grip forged from four years of hard manual labor, lifting heavy crates, scrubbing industrial floors, and holding my ground against a world that tried to crush me every single day.
Celeste stopped dead.
She swung her arm again, throwing her weight behind it to tear free.
“Let go of me!” she screeched, her voice cracking with panic. “Gabriel! Make her let go! She’s assaulting me!”
Gabriel took two long strides forward, his expression dark as a storm cloud over the Atlantic. “Celeste. Stop struggling.”
I didn't let go. I held her wrist firmly, securely, preventing her from moving an inch.
And as I held her, my eyes dropped downward.
Down, past her emerald gown. Past her shaking shoulders.
May you like
Down toward something Celeste had been doing all night long.
Something no one else in the room had noticed because they were too blinded by her diamonds, her pedigree, and her performance.
