SCORNED EX WIFE Queen Of Ashes (Camille and Stefan) novel Chapter 200

Chapter 200

Camille sat at their kitchen table, watching Alexander pour coffee into two mugs. His movements were the same as always - careful, precise, loving. He added cream to hers without asking, remembering exactly how she liked it. The small gesture that used to make her heart warm now felt like another piece of evidence in his performance.

She'd barely slept. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw those photographs of Victoria. The security plans. Richard Pierce's journal entries filled with pain and anger. Alexander's handwritten revenge list with dates that proved he'd planned their wedding knowing the truth about his uncle.

"You're quiet this morning," Alexander said, setting her mug down and kissing the top of her head. Another normal gesture that now felt poisoned.

Camille wrapped her fingers around the warm ceramic, needing something solid to hold onto. "We need to talk."

Something in her tone made Alexander pause. He sat down across from her, his dark eyes searching her face. "What's wrong?"

For a moment, she almost lost her nerve. This was Alexander. The man who'd held her when she cried about Rose. Who'd stood beside her when Victoria was in the hospital. Who'd promised to love her forever in front of everyone they cared about.

But then she remembered his voice in the darkness last night: *She suspects nothing.*

"I found the safe," she said quietly.

Alexander went completely still. The coffee mug stopped halfway to his lips. His face didn't change, but something shifted behind his eyes. The warmth disappeared, replaced by something cold and calculating.

"Which safe?" he asked, but they both knew he was buying time.

"The one in your office. Behind the cabinet. With the surveillance photos of Victoria."

Alexander set down his mug with careful control. He stared at the table for a long moment, and Camille could almost see him deciding what to say. How much to admit. How to handle this complication in his plan.

"I can explain," he said finally.

"Can you?" Camille's voice cracked despite her efforts to stay calm. "Can you explain why you have dozens of photos of Victoria taken during our wedding? Can you explain the security plans for Kane Industries? Can you explain Richard Pierce's journal?"

Alexander looked up at her then, and she saw something she'd never seen before. Not the loving husband, not the supportive partner. This was someone else entirely. Someone who'd been hiding behind Alexander's face all along.

"Yes," he said simply. "I can explain all of it."

Camille had expected him to deny everything. To lie, to make excuses, to try to convince her she'd misunderstood what she'd seen. His calm admission hit her like a physical blow.

"Victoria Kane destroyed my uncle," Alexander said, his voice steady and cold. "She deliberately covered up a factory accident that killed seventeen people. When my uncle Richard threatened to expose her, she systematically destroyed his company and his life."

Camille felt the room spinning around her. "That's not true. Victoria would never.."

"Seventeen people died because of faulty equipment that Victoria knew was dangerous," Alexander continued, ignoring her protest. "Workers with families. People with children. Victoria chose profits over human lives, and when my uncle tried to do the right thing, she crushed him like an insect."

"You're lying." But even as she said it, doubt crept into her voice. She'd seen Richard Pierce's journal entries. The pain in those pages had felt real.

Alexander leaned forward, his eyes burning with intensity. "My uncle lost everything. His company, his reputation, his will to live. Victoria made sure no one would hire him, no bank would lend to him, no business partner would trust him. She isolated him completely."

"Even if that's true," Camille said, her voice shaking, "what does that have to do with us? With our marriage?"

"I found out the night before our engagement party," Alexander said. "Someone sent me documents. Proof of what Victoria had done. Evidence that the woman who saved you was the same woman who murdered my uncle."

Camille's chest felt tight. She remembered their engagement party. How Alexander had seemed different after talking to someone she didn't recognize. How he'd been quieter, more distant in the days that followed.

"So you decided to use me," she whispered.

"I decided to get justice for my uncle." Alexander's jaw tightened. "Victoria Kane has never faced consequences for what she did. She's built an empire on the graves of innocent people, and everyone treats her like some kind of savior."

"By marrying me? By pretending to love me?"

For the first time, Alexander's controlled mask slipped. Pain flashed across his features. "It wasn't pretending. Not all of it."

"How much?" The words came out as a sob. "How much of our relationship was real, Alexander? How much of what I felt, what I believed, was actually true?"

He was quiet for a long moment, staring at his hands. "I loved you before I knew who Victoria really was. Those first months, everything you felt - I felt it too. When I realized you were connected to the woman who destroyed my family..."

"You decided to destroy me instead."

"I decided to access information that would prove Victoria's guilt. I married you to get close to her operations, to gather evidence of her crimes." Alexander looked up at her, and she saw genuine anguish in his eyes. "But somewhere along the way, my feelings became real again. The love I felt for you before I learned the truth - it came back."

Camille laughed, but it sounded more like a scream. "Real? You call surveillance photos and security plans real love?"

"I call staying awake at night worried about you real love. I call choosing to protect you from Rose real love. I call planning a future with you that goes beyond revenge real love."

"But you never stopped the revenge," Camille said, her voice breaking. "You never told me the truth. You let me believe our marriage was built on something honest while you were photographing my mother and planning to destroy her."