The Strange Groom's Cursed Bride-Chapter 49: Lexton drama

The carefully constructed act of sadness for the "poor animal" shattered. Something inside Alice snapped. The dam broke, and the succulent meat turned to ash in her mouth.

This wasn’t just about food; it was about her. The contract, the cage, the life she’d lost. The rich flavor had unwittingly become a catalyst, reminding her of the enduring torment since she signed that cursed paper, how much of her life was no longer hers, and the agonizing distance from Pauline, who felt almost held hostage.

Alice was here, eating, surviving, while everything else burned around her. A raw, ugly sob tore from her throat, followed by another, and another. She couldn’t stop. She succumbed to an ugly cry, not bothering to hide her tear-streaked face from the man across from her.

The restaurant’s gentle murmur of conversation stuttered, heads turning, whispers rising. But Alice didn’t care. She cried like the world had ended, because, for her, it had—at least until she got her incentive for enduring this charade. The stress was a physical weight.

"Is that guy making her cry?" a woman at the next table leaned in, her voice hushed but scandalized. Her companion, a middle-aged man with a wine-stained napkin, squinted at Hades’s icy expression. "Looks like it. Poor girl. She’s sobbing into her steak."

"Should we say something?"

"Are you crazy? Look at him. He’s got that ’I murder people for fun’ aura."

Nearby, a waiter hesitated, tray in hand. His subordinate shot him a "don’t you dare" glare. This was a high-end restaurant; drama was not on the menu.

"He must have broken up with her. After she struggled with him. Men, always being scums," one lady, among a group of three ladies declared.

"How do you even know that?" A second one asked.

"What else? Look at him. He doesn’t look like he cares about her."

"I can swear he got her pregnant but now denying it," the last one murmured.

Hades stared. His ’wife’ was falling apart in front of him. This was... unexpected. He had seen her angry, defiant, even calculating and annoyingly cringe. But this? Snot, tears, the occasional hiccup—it was messy. And worse, she was drawing attention to them, from people who’d never meet his eye contact if they bumped into him anywhere else.

His fingers twitched.

This was ridiculous. He stood up at once, heading toward the restroom after tossing a handkerchief at her, which landed squarely on her head.

If the murmurs weren’t already wild, they got even crazier.

Meanwhile, in another part of town—the Wildfire estate, to be precise—several phones began to blare simultaneously.

Phone Ringtone: "Emergency! Emergency! Boss is calling!"

Four phones blared at once. In a dimly lit office with a projected screen displaying maps and portraits of several faces like an FBI investigation, four heads snapped up. Dread filled them instantly as they exchanged glances. A group call. That almost never happened. Unless... there was trouble.

They hesitated, fearing to answer, yet knowing they had no choice. "Track his car and get the coordinates immediately," Gavin instructed Rowan as he answered the call, putting it on speaker, while Rowan went to work on his computer. All of them waited with bated breath for Hades to speak, expecting a declaration of war or a financial crisis.

And then... he spoke. In the most nonchalant but awkward tone ever. "She is crying."

A beat of stunned silence hung in the air, thick with disbelief.

On the other end of the line, the four men exchanged confused glances even as Rowan slowly withdrew his fingers from his computer, where he was already pulling up GPS data with the urgency of a man defusing a bomb.

Hades calling a group emergency only to announce "She is crying"? It was so far removed from their typical high-stakes alerts that for a moment, they wondered if they’d misheard, or if their boss had finally lost his mind. But no, the stern silence that followed Hades’s statement confirmed it. This was real. This was their boss. And they couldn’t afford to show their utter perplexity.

"Crying? Aurora?" Milo ventured, his voice carefully neutral, as if discussing the weather.

"Yes," Hades said, as if this were a normal report and not the most bizarre situation they’d ever been briefed on. "Continuously. And loudly."

Another pause, punctuated only by the distant hum of servers.

Gavin raised an eyebrow fractionally, a silent question mark etched on his face, while Clarisse leaned closer, as though the distance between her and the phone had somehow garbled the words. "...Why?" Clarisse blurted out before she could stop herself, a question that was probably echoing in all their minds.

There had to be a serious issue somewhere. Something that legitimately warranted a group call. Had he like... stabbed her by chance, which was why she was crying? They could... take that.

"How am I supposed to know the reason?" His voice was filled with irritation, one that made Clarisse shut her mouth faster than a vault door.

Rowan, now staring at his screen, muttered, "GPS says he’s at Lexton. That’s a... restaurant." He looked at the screen, then at his colleagues, a silent "Are you kidding me?" vibrating in the air.

Another silence. Gavin looked like he was going to have a headache, massaging his temple while quietly asking, "You called us... because Aurora is crying... at dinner?"

"Fix it." frёewebnoѵel.ƈo๓

"How the hell are we supposed to—" Rowan started, whispering as he looked at the others with the kind of look that said, ’Am I the only one listening to this right now? Because if so, I need a vacation and therapy.’

"Boss," Milo cut in, ever the diplomat and professional in the affairs of women. "Just... give her something nice and sweet."

"Or wine," Rowan added. "Lots of wine. Preferably from a large jug."

"Are you an idiot? Wouldn’t that make things worse?" Milo asked him, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Shut up you two! The most important thing is to know the reason why she is crying so we can fix—"

Click.

The line went dead. Hades had hung up. They stared at the phone, then at each other, their faces a mixture of bewilderment and the dawning realization that "fixing" this might involve an entirely new, deeply uncomfortable branch of crisis management.

---

Meanwhile, back at the restaurant, Alice had finally come to. The cathartic deluge of tears had subsided, leaving her with a puffy face, a snotty handkerchief (the one Hades had tossed her, thankfully. Not the precious one still hiding inside her pocket), and a crushing wave of mortification.

WHAT THE HELL!

Oh, God. Oh, God, oh, God. She’d just had a full-blown meltdown in a fancy restaurant, in front of Hades, and all these people. She could not even bear to turn and look at them.

What was she thinking? This wasn’t part of the plan! This was not how you survive a contractual marriage with a terrifyingly powerful man. Her face burned, and she mentally kicked herself for being so utterly, ridiculously unprofessional.

Her make up!

Was it ruined?

Should she just run away?

Maybe even jump off a bridge and just end it all?

Or the window beside her for a quicker death?

Just at that moment, Hades returned, sitting right back on his seat.

He looked utterly, magnificently pissed, his harsh gaze remaining fixed on her. Alice shifted in her seat, suddenly feeling like a small, damp rodent caught in the crosshairs of a very large, very annoyed predator. She was too scared to even attempt an apology, which would undoubtedly sound like a pathetic squeak anyway.

But once again, the universe, or perhaps the restaurant staff, decided to interrupt their tense staredown. A server, looking remarkably unperturbed by the earlier emotional fireworks, approached their table. In his hands was not a fresh napkin or a bill, but a ridiculously large cone of ice cream, piled high with scoops of what looked like every flavor known to man, drizzled with chocolate sauce, and adorned with a towering mountain of whipped cream and a cherry on top. It was less a dessert and more a sugary monument. It was the kind of thing that belonged in a children’s birthday party—not a high-end restaurant where the silverware cost more than her monthly rent. Where the hell did this come from?

Her tear-swollen eyes flicked between the dessert, the server’s painfully polite smile, and Hades, who had the expression of a man who had just ordered a hit on his own dignity.

"On your husband’s order," the server repeated, as if this clarified anything.

A beat of silence.

Then—

"What."

The word slipped out before she could stop it, flat and disbelieving.

Hades didn’t react.

The server, sensing the tension, gently set the monstrosity in front of her and bolted.

Alice’s fingers twitched. Was this a joke? A test? Some kind of psychological warfare?

She glanced at Hades again.

His jaw was clenched.

"What?" He snapped at her.

Meanwhile, the other diners had gone suspiciously quiet, their earlier whispers now replaced with rapt attention.

A middle-aged woman at the next table clutched her pearls. "Oh! He got her ice cream! How sweet! Remember when you used to get me ice cream?" she asked the middle-aged man across from her.

"Uh... not... really." The man responded awkwardly.

"Exactly! Because you never did! Another perfect reason why we are getting the divorce so sign the damn papers before Friday!" As if that wasn’t dramatic enough, she stood up and threw her glass of wine on her companion.

Uhhhs and ohhhhs resounded.

Alice stared.

Just... what had she gotten herself into in this rich people’s world?