Francois kept his relationship with Adelaida a secret, arguing that he had to wait until he turned 35, the age at which he would inherit the Pinault film empire. But Francois's plans had already changed; it didn't suit his status to have a sick child and a wife who was no longer a shadow of what she once was. He understood what his father told him when they met her at the "Les Hayes" theater, that this woman would leave him with nothing. So he blocked his desire for her to be recognized as his wife and dedicated himself to working tirelessly with his father to further grow their empire.
It was at one of the many meetings and galas he attended in the company of some single lady of Parisian high society that he met the beautiful Madeleine Gibrault, presented by his business rival, Mr. Kento Kimura, as his fiancee.
Something attracted him to her like a moth to a flame, without caring if he was going to get burned. This woman would be Adelaida's replacement, and indeed she would, as they had a great resemblance.
She was his Eloisa from ten years ago when he saw her in the theater and fell in love with her. She would serve to cover up the rumors that he had an abandoned wife in a mansion in Versailles, where he took her to live when they married to isolate her from the public eye.
His mission was to conquer that woman and take her away from Kimura to then marry her.
That's how he achieved his goal; he separated Madeleine from Kento, and he, with lies, divorced Adelaida to marry her, who was already six months pregnant. But thanks to an inexplicable divine intervention, he could not enjoy his new marriage, as he died on the way from Paris to Versailles, where he was going to take the divorce decree to Adelaida and ask her to remove her belongings from the mansion, as it now belonged to his new wife.
Adelaida is now calmer; she knows the whole truth. Her husband exchanged her for a younger woman, who ironically looks like her, and they are expecting a child. This will be the true heir to the Pinault fortune.
A week later, she is notified by the Pinault family lawyer for the reading of her deceased ex-husband's will. She arrived at the office at the agreed time, and the distinguished family was already there.
"Good morning," she greeted out of politeness, but the buzzing of a fly was heard more than the response to her decency.
"Mrs. Adelaida, please sit down, we are about to begin reading the will left by Mr. Pinault," the lawyer indicated.
Adelaida, with her innate elegance, sat where the lawyer indicated, and he proceeded to read the will.
I, Francois Pinault, in the use of all my mental faculties and in the presence of my lawyer, sign this will in which I leave ten percent of my assets to my parents, and the rest of the percentage, that is, ninety percent, to my beloved wife Madeleine Gibraud and my heir Francois Pinault Gibraud.
To my ex-wife, Adelaida DuPont, I leave a check for one hundred thousand euros in compensation for the years of marriage. Without the right to challenge this will due to the existence of a bastard child, for proof of her infidelity in these eight years of marriage, I attach the paternity test where there is no kinship with the minor Francis DuPont. In addition, the prenuptial agreements signed in the marriage are validated.
Adelaida stood up immediately upon hearing such a lie.
"That's false, Francis is Francois's son! I never cheated on my marriage," she shouted full of impotence at the lawyer.
"I always knew it, you're a slut," her ex-mother-in-law's contemptuous voice is heard loudly.
"I warned Francois, beware of that gold digger," Francois's father replied to his wife.
"Mrs. Adelaida, take the check that your deceased ex-husband left you." The lawyer took the check out of the folder, and Adelaida took it, tearing it into a thousand pieces, throwing them afterward at those present in the face as if it were party confetti.
"I don't want anything from this nefarious family; it's a good thing that supposedly my son is nothing to you. But one day Karma will come to you, and I hope it pays you worse than what you did to me and my son. If not, look, it already started with your son. I hope he suffered a slow and painful death, it's the least he deserved for being a liar, traitorous, and evil." No one answered her; they felt the anger and power of her words making their skin crawl.
Upon leaving the lawyer's office, the driver was waiting for her with a look of shame. He opened the car door for her to get in, and once inside, she burst into tears. She couldn't believe that he had denied his own son, his blood. That's what broke her, neither the abandonment nor the deception of the man she loved hurt her as much as what he did to her baby; not with her son. The tears flowed incessantly, and all the crying she had retained this week gave free rein to the baseness of her ex-husband, and she could not bear the pain.
She felt her chest opening, and she didn't care that her driver was listening to her. In eight years, it is the first time she has allowed herself to be seen in that state; not even when her son has been on the verge of death has she allowed herself to be seen vulnerable, but she couldn't take it anymore. She felt a hand touching her shoulder, and that's when she noticed that her driver had parked the car on the road and was extending a disposable tissue to her. Adelaida looked at him strangely through the mirror.
"I'm sorry, it's just that I'm very disappointed and I couldn't take it anymore," she excused herself to her driver.
"Don't worry, ma'am, cry all you need to; tears cleanse the pain." The man tried to give her comfort with his words.
"Thank you." Then she noticed that he was not starting the car and was looking at her with compassion. "Is something wrong, Mr. Dimas?" she asked, looking at him through the rearview mirror.
"Mrs. Adelaida, this is the last time I'm transporting you. I've already been ordered to take you to the mansion and not provide you with my services anymore," he hesitated with sorrow what his new bosses told him.
"Don't worry, Dimas; I imagined that was going to happen after the reading of the will. They left us with nothing." Dimas sighed in impotence, as he had affection for Adelaida, and started the car to the mansion. But nothing prepared her for what she found upon arriving.
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