She Used Me for a Dare… Now I Own Her Mother

Chapter 320: The Locked Door

Jennifer’s eyes locked on the tall figure standing at Villa Six’s entrance.

The man moved with unhurried confidence, his silhouette sharp against the warm amber light spilling from the doorway.

The door opened before he reached it, and Helena appeared, backlit and smiling, welcoming him inside like he was expected.

Like he was wanted.

Jennifer sat frozen in her car, hands white-knuckled on the steering wheel, staring at the now-empty entrance.

’So this is the one they’ve been waiting for.’

The realization settled over her like ice water.

This is what her mother had prepared. The candles. The roses. The black silk sheets. The champagne chilling in its silver bucket.

All of it.

For him.

For this... toy.

A bitter laugh caught in Jennifer’s throat.

Her mother was willing to throw everything away for this. The family. The legacy. Her own daughter’s future. All of it sacrificed so Vivienne could hide in this villa and whore around without distraction.

So she could play house while Jennifer was gift-wrapped and delivered to Richard Blackwood like livestock.

”No,” Jennifer whispered, her voice shaking with fury.

Her hands moved to the ignition.

”I won’t let this happen.”

She twisted the key. The Porsche’s engine roared to life, shattering the quiet valley.

”I won’t go down easily.”

She threw the car into reverse, tires screeching as she spun it around on the narrow road.

”I’ll expose you, Mother.”

She accelerated hard, the car shooting back up the hill toward Villa Six.

”I’ll expose your hypocrisy.”

She slammed the brakes as she reached the driveway, swerving the Porsche in behind the black sedan and cutting the engine. The car rocked to a stop, blocking him in completely.

Trapping him.

Jennifer sat there for one breath. Two.

Then she opened the door and stepped out into the cold night air, her heels hitting gravel with sharp, decisive cracks.

Her jaw was set.

Her hands were steady now.

And her eyes burned with righteous fury as she turned toward the villa’s entrance.

***

The heavy oak door stood slightly ajar, warm light spilling out onto the stone steps. She pushed it open and stepped inside.

The foyer was exactly as she’d left it minutes ago. The same amber sconces. The same trail of soft lighting leading toward the grand staircase. The same scent of vanilla and roses hanging thick in the air.

But something had changed.

Or maybe Jennifer was just seeing it differently now.

The candles didn’t look desperate anymore. They looked... intentional. Elegant. The kind of staging you’d see in a luxury hotel on an anniversary. The roses weren’t scattered haphazardly; they were arranged with careful precision, guiding the eye, creating an atmosphere that was undeniably romantic.

This wasn’t the scene of a woman having a breakdown.

This was a date.

Jennifer’s stomach twisted.

She stood in the middle of the foyer, listening.

No voices. No music. No sound of glasses clinking or laughter or conversation. Just the soft flicker of candles and a silence so complete it pressed against her eardrums like water.

’Where were they?’

Her eyes drifted toward the staircase.

Upstairs.

Of course they were upstairs.

’You couldn’t even wait,’ Jennifer thought, her lip curling in disgust. ’You couldn’t give it five minutes. Couldn’t even pretend to have a conversation first.’

Her mother had dragged him straight up those stairs like a woman possessed. No wine. No small talk. No facade of dignity.

Just raw, pathetic desperation.

But if Vivienne was that eager, that shameless, then Jennifer had to move now. Had to catch them in the act. Had to walk in before they could compose themselves, before they could construct some lie or explanation that would let her mother squirm out of accountability.

Jennifer’s feet moved.

She crossed the foyer and hit the stairs almost at a run, her heels striking the steps with sharp, rapid clicks that she didn’t bother to quiet.

The carpet muffled the sound somewhat, turning her footsteps into urgent whispers, but she didn’t slow down. The air grew warmer as she climbed, thicker, the scent of musk and roses intensifying until it was almost dizzying.

She didn’t care.

She had to get there. Had to see it with her own eyes. Had to have proof that couldn’t be denied or twisted or explained away.

Jennifer reached the landing, breathing hard, her chest heaving not from exertion but from pure, incandescent fury.

The hallway stretched before her, dimly lit by wall sconces turned down to their lowest setting. At the far end, the double doors to the master suite loomed in the shadows. A sharp sliver of golden light bled out onto the dark carpet from beneath the frame, warm and inviting and utterly wrong.

Jennifer took a step forward. Then another.

Halfway down the hall, she heard it.

A sound that froze the blood in her veins.

It wasn’t a word. It wasn’t a gasp of surprise. It was a moan. A deep, guttural, trembling vibration that echoed off the high ceiling of the master suite and bled straight through the heavy mahogany doors. It was a sound of pure, unadulterated, shameless pleasure.

It was so loud, so completely raw, that goosebumps erupted across Jennifer’s bare arms. Her skin crawled with a suffocating wave of second-hand embarrassment and a creeping, paralyzing dread.

Jennifer stopped dead in her tracks. Her furious, righteous momentum vanished in a heartbeat, leaving her glued to the carpet.

’No,’ she thought, her stomach dropping into an endless abyss. ’Please, God, no. Let it be someone else. Let it be Helena.’

She gripped the strap of her purse so hard her knuckles ached. She desperately wanted to believe it was the assistant. But she knew.

Even warped by blind, starving lust, the underlying timbre of that voice was unmistakable.

It was her mother.

Vivienne Vanderbilt, the untouchable Ice Queen who never raised her voice, who never lost her composure, was making noises like a feral, desperate animal.

Then, another sound cut through the heavy, vanilla-scented air.

A man’s voice.

”That’s it. Look at me.”

The voice dripped with absolute, undeniable authority... and a dark, magnetic heat that made Jennifer’s own breath hitch involuntarily.

The reality of what was happening on the other side of that wall crashed into her.

Panic, mixed with a morbid, inescapable curiosity, propelled her forward. She crossed the final few feet to the double doors, her hand trembling as she reached out. The sliver of golden light wasn’t coming from an open gap... it was bleeding from beneath the doorframe.

She grabbed the ornate brass handle and pushed.

Nothing.

She twisted it downward, pulling with all her weight.

It didn’t budge.

Locked.

The heavy deadbolt had been thrown. The realization washed over her like a bucket of ice water. She was too late. She had stormed up here to catch them, to shame them, to stop it before it went too far... but they had already sealed themselves inside their own private world.

She was trapped in the hallway, forced to listen to the wet, shifting sounds of silk, another breathless, degrading whimper from her mother, and that low, commanding voice praising her for it.

She couldn’t kick the door down. She couldn’t scream.

But she couldn’t just walk away, either. The need to know, the dark, agonizing curiosity, clawed at her mind like a physical ache.

​Her panicked eyes darted up and down the dim hallway, searching frantically for another way in, another angle, another crack in the fortress.