Amelia's eyes, a tempestuous whirlpool of anger and betrayal, fixed upon the two men before her. "You," she hissed at Dane, each word a venomous dart. "You have no respect, not for me, not for this family!" Her voice crescendoed into a roar, clawing through the plush silence of the hospital corridor.
"Look at him, Dad! Your precious grandson," Amelia spat the words as if they left a sour taste in her mouth, her head snapping toward Sebastian with disdain. "This is what he brings us to—shame!" The air crackled with her fury; the chandelier above swayed as if in fear. "Marley, for God's sake. Our Marley, and he... he..." She couldn't even say it, but the implication hung heavy and vile.
"Everyone coddles you, Dane!" Amelia's accusation sliced through the quiet, her eyes spearing him. "The golden boy, the heir—we all wanted to see you settled, married. But with Marley? Oscar's wife?" Her words were sharp enough to draw blood, her glare searing through Dane's armor of indifference.
Sebastian, the stoic pillar of the Adams lineage, was visibly shaken. His hand trembled like autumn leaves in a storm; his coughs racked his body, a machine gun staccato tearing through the tension. The butler sprang forward, a lifeline thrown in turbulent seas, murmuring hushed reassurances that were barely audible over the pounding hearts and stifled gasps.
"Easy, sir," the butler murmured, though his eyes darted nervously to the towering matriarch.
"Are you not ashamed?" Amelia's voice rose to a crescendo, her question rhetorical and laced with contempt. "To bed your cousin's wife—what depravity has taken hold of you?"
The bodyguards stood like statues, holding their breath, careful not to attract the maelstrom's eye. Every syllable that fell from Amelia's lips seemed to charge the air with electricity, a palpable current of disgrace and indignation.
"Immoral doesn't begin to cover it," she spat out, her words slicing through the tense silence that had befallen the room. "You've made jesters out of us all!"
"Ever consider interrogating your son about that hotel night?" His question sliced across the tension, everyone's eyes swiveling to Oscar whose face darkened with recollection.
"Hotel?" Oscar's voice croaked, recognition sparking like a flare in the dark. He knew. They all knew now.
Dane stood there, an island in a maelstrom, his face a mask of ice. He was the eye of the storm, the untouchable center while chaos reigned around him. Oscar, caught in the crossfire, looked like he wished the earth would swallow him whole.
"Amelia, maybe you missed the cue," Dane's voice held a wry edge, "your precious boy set the stage on my bed." His lips twitched, not quite a smile, more a grimace of irony as he turned to Amelia.
All eyes swiveled, fixating on Oscar with an intensity that could bore holes. The man who once stood tall, now reduced to a shadow slinking in guilt.
Oscar, the man embroiled in indignation, paced like a caged beast. "I wanted out," he blurted, voice loud, ringing against the white walls. "Just some nude pictures, you know? Sleeping pills, click, flash—evidence for an easy divorce."
He spun on his heel, face contorting. "But this? Marley with him?" His finger jabbed in Dane's direction, a gesture loaded with betrayal. "Never wanted her in another's bed, especially not Dane's!"
The confession hung heavy, a cloud of incredulity and dismay. Marley, under the scrutiny, shrank back into the crisp linens, her thoughts trapped in a cyclone of 'what now?' Dane's eyes were chips of ice, Oscar's a blaze of wounded pride.
"Photos," Dane echoed, the word dripping with scorn. "Quite the plan, cousin. No wonder she chose actual warmth over your cold scheming."
"Shut it, Dane," Oscar snarled, the words bitten off sharp and savage.
"Enough," Amelia finally breathed, the command weak, her matriarchal authority faltering under the weight of family disgrace.
In the silence that followed, the truth lay bare, ugly and twisted—a tableau of broken trust and shattered decorum.
The chime of the elevator cut through the heavy silence, its doors sliding open like a curtain on the final act. A doctor, white coat fluttering, emerged like a herald of fate, clutching papers that sang of destiny encoded in DNA.
"Mr. Adams," he said, voice quiet but insistent as he handed over the report with a reverence reserved for sacred texts.
Sebastian's hand, steady as a rock amid tempests, closed around the document. The others, a tableau of tension, didn't dare to breathe too loud, their eyes flitting from the paper to each face, searching for a sign, any sign.
Sebastian unfolded the report, his gaze sinking into the lines and numbers that sealed futures. The silence stretched, a taut string ready to snap. Then, the patriarch's head lifted, eyes aged but sharp, cutting across the room to where Marley sat, small and cornered by her own spiraling thoughts.
"Damn it," she muttered under her breath, her fingers white-knuckled on the blanket. What now? What next?
The old man's lips parted, his voice graveled and iron-clad, "This child will be born." No room for debate, no space for protest.
Marley's heart thudded, a rabbit trapped before the hounds. Born this baby. Like it was just that simple. Her thoughts spun wild, seeking escape but finding none.
"Born?" Dane's eyebrow arched, words laced with mock innocence. "How progressive of us."
"Shut it, Dane," Oscar snapped, the tremor in his voice betraying him. "You've done enough."
"Done?" Dane let out a cold chuckle. "I'm just getting started."
"Enough!" Sebastian's thunderous command echoed off the walls. "We are Adams. We weather storms. We keep legacies."
"Legacies," Marley echoed, hollow laughter bubbling up unwanted. What a cursed legacy this would be.
"Silence," Sebastian hissed, and they all obeyed, puppets to his will.
"Your point, Grandfather?" Dane prodded, challenging the titan.
"Life," Sebastian declared, "is not a game of chess. This is blood. Our blood."
"Blood," Marley whispered to herself, the word tasting like iron on her tongue. Her future, once a vast horizon, now shrank to the confines of this room, the decree of an old man, and the damning lines of a report.