Chapter 64: Shelia's POV - Esther's Madness

By the time I arrived at the banquet hall, chaos had already erupted. To prevent Jack from escaping, Travis had dragged him inside. The crowd had formed a wide circle around the center, and from the looks of things, I could piece together what had happened.

A woman on the floor was being restrained by two soldiers from the peacekeeping force, and a handgun lay nearby. On the stage, Hugh was shielding Esther, holding her close. It seemed clear—the woman on the floor had fired at Esther, and Hugh had saved her.

Meanwhile, the video continued playing on the large screen, showing a brutal scene of a woman and a child being killed. The footage ended with a freeze-frame of Esther’s face. Given what Jack had said earlier, I now fully understood what was going on.

Esther had brought Jack to the engagement party with the true goal of finding this woman. But because Travis and I had intervened, Jack had been captured, causing Esther’s plan to fail and giving the woman a chance to attack her.