"Your—" Priscilla started, her voice faltering entirely, the scissors slipping slightly in her suddenly unsteady grip. "Your wife?"
The words came out barely above a whisper, though the silent foyer carried them easily to every gathered guest still watching from the staircase, several audible gasps rippling through the crowd as the full weight of the revelation settled over the room.
Julian rose to his full height, positioning himself protectively beside Margaret, his expression carrying a cold, controlled fury now fully directed at the woman who, moments earlier, had cut his pregnant wife's hair and drawn blood from her forehead in front of an audience of arriving guests.
"Yes," he said, his voice carrying clearly across the silent foyer. "My wife. Six months pregnant with our first child, kneeling on your marble floor with a cut on her forehead because you decided her braid wasn't presentable enough for your gala."
Priscilla's face had drained of all color entirely, the severed braid still dangling forgotten from her trembling fingers, her earlier cruel confidence entirely collapsed under the devastating weight of exactly who she'd just humiliated in front of her most important guests.