You Weren’t Invited to My Wedding, Ex! - Chapter 75: Chapter 75

Three little faces lit up the room, laughing, running barefoot through a sunlit field. I’d filmed it last spring, when the cherry blossoms were still blooming. Their voices filled the space like angels had decided to sing. One of the boys tackled his sister into a pile of petals, giggling.
“Mommy! Look at me!”
“Daddy, catch me!”
“I’m faster than you!”
And then came the part I knew would shatter him.
The camera turned—Salvatore.
Kneeling. Arms open. Laughing.
He scooped them into a hug, spinning all three in his arms. One of the boys kissed his cheek.
“Love you, Daddy.”
I saw Reagan freeze like someone had stabbed him in the spine. His entire body locked.
The camera panned to me in the background—soft smile, hand on my growing garden. Happy. Alive.
“Come here, my angels,” my voice said from the recording.
“Time to eat.”
“Yes, Mommy!”
Reagan exploded.
“NO! NO—NO—WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?!”
He screamed like a rabid animal. Punched the wall so hard the sound cracked through the feed.
“Those are my kids!” he roared, pointing at the screen. “MY FUCKING HEIRS!”
He stumbled toward the projector, fury tearing through him.
“THAT’S MY FUCKING BLOOD, DANICA! THEY’RE MINE!”
His voice cracked, raw and unhinged.
“They’re calling him Daddy?! That son of a bitch?! You let—YOU LET HIM TOUCH THEM?!”
He grabbed a chair and flung it into the wall. The projector flickered but kept playing. The children laughed louder, hugging Salvatore, climbing over his shoulders.
Reagan dropped to his knees, shaking.
“You took everything from me!” he sobbed. “You crazy bitch! Those are MY FUCKING CHILDREN!”
And then my voice played over the scene.
“You didn’t just lose me, Reagan.
You lost the right to ever find me.”
He stared, mouth trembling. The screen faded to black. Silence echoed in the room like a tomb.
I looked over at Salvatore, who said nothing. His jaw was clenched, eyes unreadable.
“Let him break,” I whispered. “Let him feel the void I had to crawl out of.”
Salvatore poured me a glass of champagne and handed it over.
“You’re colder than I’ve ever seen you,” he murmured.
I sipped it slowly, savoring the quiet devastation on the feed.
“Good,” I said calmly. “I was too warm before.”
Salvatore turned to me, voice low. “This won’t stop him. He’s not hunting you for power anymore.”
I tilted my head.
“He wants you back,” he finished. “Not the empire. Not the money. You. The kids. The life he threw away.”
I smiled, cold and sharp.
“Then let him keep chasing ghosts,” I said. “Because the woman he lost… doesn’t exist anymore.”
I toasted the screen one last time, as Reagan clawed at the wall like a man possessed.
“Enjoy your hell, darling. I built it just for you.”
+++
The next morning, I wore black. Not for mourning.
For war.
Titanis—the empire my father built with sweat, blood, and steel—was finally mine again. The world didn’t know it yet. But they would.
At dawn, the final acquisition papers hit my desk. Forty-seven shell companies. Twenty-four anonymous investors. Three years of whispers, meetings behind closed doors, and dirty deals made with white gloves. It all came down to one last thing.
One signature.
Mine.
I signed it in ink so dark it might as well have been blood.
Titanis was no longer a kingdom of Deception. It was reborn. And now it bore the name it was always meant to:
McKellar.
I didn’t cry when the documents were finalized. Didn’t tremble. Didn’t even blink. That girl—soft, hopeful, desperate to belong—was gone. The woman standing now? She belonged only to vengeance and legacy.
Salvatore handed me the closing papers in a black leather folder, embossed with my crest. De Santis Holdings.
“Three years,” he said quietly. “And now it’s yours.”
I turned to face him. Salvatore—my consigliere in the shadows, my shield in public. One of the best legal minds in the world, disguised as the most dangerous man I knew. While he ran the underworld as Mr. X, he moved through boardrooms like a ghost with claws.
My personal lawyer. My monster in a suit.
“Thank you,” I said, firm. “For every deal. Every lie. Every firewall.”
He looked at me the way only he could—like I was the fire and he’d already decided to burn for me.
“You earned this,” he said. “I just watched the world fall into place for you.”
“No,” I whispered, taking the papers and pressing them to my chest. “You made it fall.”
---
We drove in silence, wind slicing through the morning fog as we reached the graveyard.
I stood alone. No press. No guards. Just marble, grass, and ghosts. My mother. My twin sister. My father.
Names carved into granite, left to be forgotten. But I hadn’t forgotten. Never.
I stepped forward, heels crushing gravel, coat fluttering like a banner in war. No flowers. No tears.
“My life was stolen,” I said softly. “But now I’ve stolen it back.”
I bent down, brushing dust from my mother’s name. My fingers lingered on the stone—warm from the sun.
“It’s done.”
Behind me, Salvatore stayed silent. Respectful. Deadly.
And mine.
Salvatore drove me back from the cemetery in silence. Until he finally said the thing I knew he was holding in.
“He’s not after power anymore, Dani.”
I turned to him, brows raised.
Salvatore’s voice was low. Dead serious. “Reagan. He’s not trying to control you. He wants you back.”
I laughed once—cold and sharp. “He’s lost everything. His father. His mistress. His legacy. All he has left to chase is the one thing he never truly had.”
“Which is?”
“Me.”