Cold water hit like concrete. Lily screamed into my neck. I surfaced choking, dragged her up, and looked at the edge.

Nobody moved.

Not my mother. Not my father. Not Chloe.

Some of the guests were laughing.

Then Mark stepped forward, lifted his champagne, and grinned down at me.

“This,” he said, “is why you don’t invite poor people to good parties.”

That did it.

I climbed out of the fountain with Lily shaking in my arms and looked straight at my family.

“Remember this,” I said. “All of you.”

My father smirked.

He thought that was the end of it.

It wasn’t even the start.

May be an image of flower and wedding

PART 2

I stood there dripping, my dress clinging to my skin, Lily trembling in my arms like a leaf in a storm. The laughter didn’t stop immediately—it lingered, echoing across the marble and fairy lights like something alive. I could feel it crawling under my skin. My father looked proud. My mother looked satisfied. Chloe? She looked relieved. Like the stain on her dress wasn’t the worst thing anymore—I was. I had become the spectacle that saved her night.