The Strange Groom's Cursed Bride-Chapter 66: The strange call

The Matriarch’s parlor was dim, dressed in shadows. Not because the lights weren’t on, but because she preferred it that way. Soft, moody lighting that masked the fury always simmering just beneath her meticulously composed surface.

Tonight, it boiled over.

She sat, stiff-backed in her favorite green velvet chair, eyes cold and glassy like polished jade. The small tumbler of scotch in her hand trembled from the sheer force of her grip. Her immaculate, crimson nails bit into the crystal, leaving faint crescent marks.

Across from her, Betty stood stiffly, hands clenched at her sides, a palpable aura of dread emanating from her.

"...He refused," Betty said, almost in a whisper, her voice barely audible above the Matriarch’s simmering rage. "He said... she would be moving in with him. That it was final."

A heavy silence descended, thick with unspoken consequence. Betty had dreaded passing this information to her in person; it had kept her wary and on edge all day, until this moment.

Then, the Matriarch moved.

The tumbler flew from her hand like a bullet. It smashed against the wall beside Betty’s head, shattering in a spectacular explosion of glass and amber liquid. Shards rained down, glittering like malevolent jewels.

Betty flinched, stumbled back a step, then froze, wide-eyed and motionless, like a deer caught mid-death.

The Matriarch didn’t even look at the wreckage. Her voice was ice, cold and sharp, gliding over the mess as if it didn’t exist.

"Get out."

Betty didn’t need to be told twice. She turned and scurried out of the room like a rat fleeing fire, her rapid footsteps fading down the hall.

Another silence. This one heavier. Thicker. Weighted with unspoken threats.

Then the door opened.

Van entered.

He took in the broken glass, the lingering tension in the air, and his mother’s rigid posture as he slowly, deliberately, closed the door behind him.

"Trouble?" he said, his voice low, almost resigned.

"Don’t start," Elisa growled at him, her eyes still fixed on some invisible point of fury in the distance.

Van stepped further into the room, his tone carefully neutral. "I heard about the refusal."

"Hades is becoming reckless," she spat, her voice laced with venom. "I’ve indulged him too long. And now, he thinks he can openly disobey me." She half scoffed, half laughed in disbelief, the sound brittle and humorless.

Van remained silent, watching her.

She stood now, pacing in slow, trembling lines across the plush rug. "It’s bad enough that rumors are rising, which may drag our name through the mud. But now... he dare thinks he can control this marriage? Move her in? Give her protection? Defy me? HA!" The laugh was sharper this time, bordering on hysterical.

"...Maybe he likes her?" Van said finally, hesitantly.

The Matriarch stopped. Her pacing ceased abruptly.

She turned to face him, eyes narrow, like slits of emerald ice. "What did you say?"

Van lifted his shoulders in a small shrug, maintaining a carefully blank expression. "Just a possibility. Hades has never cared about anything or anyone. Never been attached to anything. But suddenly... he’s just arrived in the country. Marrying the girl willingly. Picking her up and driving her about, showing up for family dinners. Preventing her from doing chores..."

She stared at him, her mouth tightening into a thin, furious line.

Van stepped closer, pressing his point. "I’m just saying... if he likes her, isn’t that a good thing? It means we finally have leverage. Something he cares about. Something we can... use if he tries to be stubborn in the future. A weakness."

The Matriarch’s fists clenched at her sides, her knuckles stark white against her crimson nails. "Don’t speak to me like I’m a fool."

"I’m not," Van replied, his voice unwavering. "I’m trying to help. You keep calling him dangerous, but a dangerous man with something to lose is easier to trap."

She hissed under her breath, a reptilian sound, turning her back on him once more. Her voice dropped low, dark, shaking with an old, festering hatred. "I hate the Malays."

Van’s expression darkened, a shadow falling over his features.

She kept going, oblivious to his reaction, or perhaps uncaring. "Riff-raff. And now we’re tied to them. Tied because of you! If you hadn’t been so stupid, we would never have needed that alliance. Never needed to bury things."

Van’s jaw clenched, a muscle jumping in his cheek. "Don’t start with that."

She whirled on him, her eyes blazing. "YOU started it. If you hadn’t ruined everything. If you hadn’t disgraced this family—"

"I didn’t do it!" he snapped, the words ripping from him before he could stop them, raw and desperate. His face twisted in frustration. "How many times do I have to say it? I didn’t hit anyone. I wasn’t high on drugs. I don’t know what happened that night."

"You don’t know? Because you were too doped up to remember!" she fired back, her voice dripping with scorn. "Do you think I wanted to cover for you? You nearly tore the family down."

"I wasn’t on drugs!" Van’s voice cracked, filled with a tormented fury. He looked like he wanted to rip his hair out, pacing a few desperate steps. "For the last time—I don’t remember what happened because I wasn’t even driving! There was blood, sure. A dent on the car. But I didn’t—! I would remember doing something like that!"

The Matriarch’s voice dropped into a venomous whisper, cold and lethal.

"There’s no one else to blame. And if you ever make the mistake of getting linked to anything again, you’re out. Do you understand me? Cut out. Like rot."

He stared at her, his chest heaving, trapped.

She moved closer, invading his space, her eyes unblinking.

"You saw the news? The drug house that got raided?"

"...Yeah." His voice was barely a whisper.

"Well, you better pray. Because if your name ever ends up associated with it, even once, I’ll cut you out of this family like rot."

His mouth opened, then closed, unable to form words. Then, trembling with a primal rage, he shouted:

"I DON’T DO DRUGS!"

And with that, he turned and slammed the door behind him, the sound echoing like a gunshot in the tense, cold room, leaving behind only the Matriarch and the lingering scent of scotch and shattered glass.

The Matriarch stared after him in silence, her chest rising and falling imperceptibly.

She would have only stuck to having Dawin.

*****

The air in the top-floor office of Malay Corporation was always brisk, set deliberately colder than necessary, to match the calculated chill of its managing partner, Pricillia Malay.

Her sharp heels echoed across the polished marble as she stepped in, freshly returned from an emergency policy meeting. Her expression was unreadable, her lip-gloss unbothered by the stress of billion-bucks decisions.

One of her assistants, Reno, a man usually composed, was waiting by the door, unusually stiff. That was Pricillia’s first clue something was off. The second was the uncharacteristic bead of sweat glistening just beneath his temple, despite the powerful air conditioning.

"Director," he began cautiously, his voice tight, "a call came in. No caller ID."

"And? Why is that a problem?" She asked in a dismissive tone, dropping her leather folder onto the desk with a sharp thud.

"I tried. But... they said something." Reno swallowed, his eyes darting to the private phone clutched in his hand.

She stopped mid-turn, her hand still on the back of her ergonomic chair. Her gaze cut to him like a scalpel, sharp and demanding. "What."

"They mentioned... ’Alice’."

That one word turned the air to glass. Pricillia froze, her carefully constructed composure fracturing. The casual dismissiveness vanished from her face, replaced by a stark, unnerving stillness.

"...What...?" The word was barely a whisper, a stark contrast to her usual commanding tone.

"They said they would call again—"

Before Reno could finish, the phone in his hand began to ring, a jarring, insistent sound in the sudden silence. Both their attentions snapped to the device.

Pricillia hesitated for a fraction of a second, her eyes narrowed at the ringing phone. Then, with the fluid grace of someone ready to sever a throat with words, she stretched out her hand. "Give me the phone."

He handed her the private phone. Pricillia pressed it to her ear, her posture rigid, her aura radiating cold authority.

"This is Pricillia Malay," she said, her voice like chipped ice. "And whoever this is, you’re either grossly misinformed or out of your mind."

The voice that responded wasn’t frantic or panicked. It was calm. Unnaturally calm. Filtered through a voice distorter that made it impossible to tell if it was male or female, young or old. Just... steady. Inhumanly steady.

"Your firm is representing the wrong side of a very inconvenient drug raid," the voice said softly, the words sliding like silk over razor blades. "You’ll receive the files. Names. Charges. You will get them out."

"I don’t take narcotics cases," she snapped, her jaw clenching. "I run a clean—"

"Of course you do," the voice interrupted, completely unbothered, a subtle hum beneath the distorted words. "And that’s why this is only a favor, not a negotiation."

Her nostrils flared.

Updated from fr𝒆ewebnov𝒆l.(c)om