The Love I Begged For Was Never Real novel Chapter 18

Nora froze in place; she hadn't known a single thing about Giselle dating.

Giselle guarded her privacy from Nora like she was a thief, refusing even to let her step foot in the Manor. Why would she ever share details of her personal life?

Gideon hadn't bothered to ask for the whole story, immediately slapping Nora with accusations of negligence and malice.

Late that night, Gideon took Giselle straight to the Manor. Nora followed them back and witnessed an unprecedented, explosive argument between the two.

In the bright, spacious living room, Gideon used harsh words on Giselle for the very first time.

He sternly ordered her to sever all contact with the man, confiscated her car keys and credit cards, and instituted a strict eight o'clock curfew.

Having been babied her whole life, Giselle couldn't handle the perceived injustice of being grounded. She shattered an antique tea set on the coffee table, her eyes red as she screamed at Gideon.

"You're not even my real brother! What gives you the right to control who I date?!"

Throwing those words at him, she stormed upstairs, slammed her bedroom door shut, locked it, and declared a hunger strike.

Gideon sat on the couch with his face buried in his hands, radiating a suffocating despair.

"Gideon..."

Nora had barely spoken his name.

He looked up, his eyes bloodshot, his voice freezing cold. "Nora, did it make you happy watching Giselle mess around with other men? Did you think that if she belonged to someone else, I'd finally look at you?"

For a full twenty-four hours, the Manor's staff brought up exquisite meals and knocked on her door, receiving zero response. The entire household was suffocating under a heavy gloom.

Gideon stayed stationed outside Giselle's door that entire time.

She stood there like a voyeur in the shadows, witnessing Gideon hang on Giselle's every move and soft word.

The playboy's family was fairly prominent locally. But under Gideon's irrational, frantic retaliation, it took less than two weeks for their corporate cash flow to completely shatter. The company was forced into bankruptcy, and the entire family quietly moved overseas, never daring to show their faces in the business world again.

And after fasting for a day, Giselle finally opened the door.

She threw herself into Gideon's arms crying, accepting his apology along with his ruthless elimination of all her romantic prospects.

She remained the untouchable princess on a pedestal; whatever she wanted, Gideon provided.

Nora took a sip of her coffee, the bitter taste sliding down her throat and settling heavily in her heart.

She looked across at Lucia, her eyes utterly devoid of hope.