Slap!

A fierce, resounding slap cracked across Shane’s face.

Clutching his burning cheek, he stared at her in absolute disbelief, "You... How dare you hit me?!"

"I will hit you whenever I please; do I truly require a designated calendar date to discipline you?" Sienna lightly shook out her hand, her tone dripping with pure disdain. "Shane Vance, pack away that nauseating, arrogant act of yours. I only stepped out here to inform you that your barking is disrupting my rest."

She offered a subtle nod to the guard standing beside them.

The guard immediately presented a premium leather folder.

Sienna snatched it up, opening the binder and shoving it directly before Shane’s eyes, "Take a good look. This is an itemized asset ledger compiled over consecutive nights by my attorneys and forensic accountants. It includes, but is securely not limited to, every piece of high jewelry, luxury goods, real estate properties, and even the vacation expenses you accumulated... totaling this exact figure."

Her polished finger tapped sharply against an astronomical sum.

"These funds constitute our marital community property. Given that you willfully misappropriated them to finance a mistress without ever securing my explicit consent, I reserve the absolute legal right to claw them back."

"You have exactly three days to wire this capital—with accumulated interest—directly into my designated account. Otherwise, I will see you in court."

Shane stood entirely stupefied, "Sienna! You... Have you lost your mind?! Those were things you voluntarily gave—"

"Voluntarily banking you does not equate to voluntarily letting you use my capital to support another woman," Sienna cut him off icily. "Our conversation is officially concluded. Every thread of sentiment between us has been thoroughly severed. Now, remove yourself from my sight this instant, before my security detail treats you with absolute hostility!"

"Sienna! You can't do this to me!" Panicking, Shane took a desperate step forward, reaching out to seize her wrist.

The guard directly parried his arm, using a heavy force to shove him away from her.

"Get your hands off me! Do you have any idea who I am?!"

Shane roared, struggling and flailing violently, but he was ultimately shoved ruthlessly out of the gates. His foot caught against the heavy stone threshold, and he went crashing down onto the pavement in absolute ruin.

The heavy iron gates slammed shut before his eyes with a deafening Clang.

He scrambled to lift his head, but he was met with nothing more than the absolute, final sight of Sienna's retreating back, leaving him momentarily paralyzed in a state of hollow shock.

Returning to his quarters in absolute despair, Shane drowned himself in an ocean of alcohol until he was thoroughly intoxicated.

The heavy liquor numbed his nerves, yet it served only to amplify his intense resentment and burning fury.

He snatched up his phone, dialing Sienna’s sequence time and time again, only to be met with the same frozen, automated response: "We're sorry, the number you are dialing is currently busy..."

She had actually blacklisted his primary number entirely!

Consumed by a volatile fury, he forcefully snatched a phone out of his friend's hand, punching in the familiar sequence once more.

This time, the call connected cleanly.

"Sienna! Exactly how long do you intend to persist with this madness?!" Shane roared into the receiver. "Is this all just because you are bitter that I neglected you in the past?! I am currently—"

"Shane Vance," Sienna interrupted him, her voice thick with absolute exhaustion. "I believed I made myself abundantly clear during our last encounter. We are entirely finished."

"Everything in our past was nothing more than a tedious game I chose to play with you. Now that I have grown thoroughly bored of it, it is only natural that I kick an unsatisfactory toy out of my sight. Do you understand?"

She let out a faint, dismissive sneer, "Stop calling this number. It makes you look exceptionally pathetic."

With that, she severed the line instantly.

Shane stood frozen with the phone pressed to his ear, his entire body breaking into a cold sweat.

Suddenly, the front doorbell rang.

His friend moved to answer it, returning a moment later with a document in hand, his face a mask of complete bewilderment as he presented it, "Shane... this was just delivered for you. Is this a... formal court summons?"

Staring at the vibrant scarlet seal of the high court stamped across the envelope, a violent shudder rippled through Shane, and cold sweat instantly drenched his back.

She was genuinely playing for keeps! Every word she had uttered was the absolute truth!

A short while later, the designated court date arrived.

Given the ironclad, indisputable nature of the forensic evidence, Shane suffered an immediate, crushing defeat in court, ordered by judicial decree to immediately return the astronomical sum itemized by Sienna.

When Stella learned of the verdict, her eyes stretched wide in sheer panic.

Yet, she forced herself to maintain a fragile, composed persona, murmuring softly, "Shane, as long as there is life, there is hope... Why don't you go to Sienna and lower your pride a little? Speak a few tender words to her? She used to love you so passionately, if her heart softens even a fraction..."

A desperate trace of wishful thinking ignited deep in Shane's chest. Gnashing his teeth, he went straight to the ground floor of Sienna's corporate headquarters to lie in wait for her.

He lost all track of time as he waited, until he finally caught sight of Sienna stepping out of the grand lobby.

Shane's eyes ignited with instant hope, and he moved to rush forward, only to freeze dead in his tracks as he witnessed a magnificent, aristocratic man walking closely by her side. The stranger was leaning down to share a private smile with Sienna, their posture dripping with an intimate, effortless familiarity.

His eyes stretched wide in absolute shock.

Yet, gathering the ragged remains of his courage, he managed to choke out in a dry, hollow voice, "Sienna... we... we need to talk..."

Acted as if he were nothing more than thin air, Sienna naturally looped her arm through the stranger's, gliding right past him without granting him even a passing glance.

Shane stood entirely paralyzed, his eyes wide as he watched their silhouettes drift further and further away into the distance.

A sudden, crushing realization slammed into his mind: every word Sienna had uttered to him was the absolute truth.

She genuinely, completely... did not care anymore.

Chapter 10

The news of Shane losing the lawsuit swept through New York’s entire elite circle like wildfire.

Almost simultaneously, his company’s collaborative projects fell through one after another.

The partners who had once called him a brother either avoided him entirely or merely brushed him off with hollow, superficial laughter over the phone.

One of the owners, who still shared a thread of history with him, clapped his shoulder after getting thoroughly intoxicated and shook his head.

"Shane, don't blame me for being blunt... Back then, we only collaborated with you out of respect for Miss Fontaine. But now... haha, who would dare touch you with a ten-foot pole?"

"With a single word from the Fontaine family, how are the rest of us supposed to survive in this circle?"

Shane ground his teeth, desperately searching for new partners, yet not a single soul dared to make contact with him.

Shortly after, the bank demanded the repayment of loans, the company’s financial accounts plunged into a rapid deficit, and the remaining employees scattered like monkeys from a falling tree.

In less than half a month, the company he had meticulously managed for years was forced to declare bankruptcy and liquidation.

Furthermore, back then, simply to appease Stella and to settle a petty grievance—to prove he could maintain a lavish lifestyle without Sienna—he had gritted his teeth to rent this premier luxury villa.

Now, however, he couldn't even produce the rent for the upcoming quarter.

He attempted to contact Stella, subtly hinting at his current financial crisis, hoping she could temporarily provide some capital to tide them over.

Yet Stella either played entirely dumb or claimed with tear-filled eyes that her funds had been exhausted to support her own family, leaving virtually nothing.

On this particular day, Shane returned to the rented estate, thoroughly exhausted.

From a distance, he caught sight of an absolute ruin at the front gates of the villa.

Several unfamiliar laborers were brutally tossing furniture and random personal effects into a chaotic heap along the roadside.

Stella was clutching the landlord’s sleeve, weeping a torrential downpour of pathetic tears.

"Mr. King, please grant us a few more days, just a few days, alright? Shane will absolutely find a way, I beg of you..."

Beside them, Nate was wailing hysterically at the top of his lungs, utterly terrified.

"Grant you more time? I've already given you an entire week!" The landlord impatiently shook off Stella's grip. "If you have no capital, why on earth did you rent a luxury estate? Snatch up your belongings and get out! Stop disrupting my business!"