Chapter 2 - The Glass House
The conservatory felt as though all the oxygen had been sucked out of it.
Vanessa’s fingers went entirely rigid around the microphone. A sharp, high-pitched feedback whine echoed through the speakers as she dropped her hand completely.
“That... that was an investment transfer,” Thomas stammered, his face turning an unhealthy shade of crimson. “It was for the maintenance of the estate! For Whitmore Ridge!”
“Whitmore Ridge isn’t owned by V-Ridge Holdings,” Claire said, breaking her long silence.
Her voice was liquid crystal—smooth, effortless, and terrifyingly calm. She stood up beside Grant, smoothing the skirt of her gown.
“Whitmore Ridge was placed into a protected historic land trust by my mother five days before she passed away,” Claire continued, looking around the room at the faces of her family’s oldest friends. “It can never be sold, mortgaged, or transferred to a private LLC without the unanimous consent of all biological heirs. Namely... Daniel and me.”
Daniel looked from his sister to his father, his eyes wide with shock. “Dad... what did you sign?”
“Nothing!” Vanessa declared loudly, her voice cracking as she regained her footing. She clicked her heels against the marble as she stepped down from the dais. “This is absurd! An uninvited guest comes into my house, reads fake bank records, and you all just listen? Security!”
Two burly men in black suits standing near the conservatory entrance shifted uncomfortably, but neither of them moved toward Grant.
“They won’t step forward, Vanessa,” Grant said quietly. “Because they work for Vance Security Solutions. A subsidiary of my firm. I hired them for Daniel’s wedding security three days ago when Claire told me she was worried about the catering staff not being paid.”
Daniel gasped, looking at Emily. “The caterers... you said you paid them last week, Vanessa!”
“I paid the deposit!” Vanessa hissed, her composure rapidly eroding into raw, ugly panic. “This is my stepdaughter’s sick revenge! She’s hated me since the day I walked through that door! She couldn’t stand that her father moved on! She couldn’t stand that someone else was running this house!”
“You didn’t run this house, Vanessa,” Claire said, taking three slow steps toward the center aisle. “You stripped it.”
Claire reached into her small silver clutch and pulled out a single folded piece of paper.
“When my mother died,” Claire said, addressing the room rather than the woman in front of her, “she left three million dollars in trust for Daniel’s education and my mother’s historic restoration fund. She also left a private collection of eighteen Dutch Masters paintings, six heirloom jewelry sets dating back to 1890, and the original deed to the timberland in Vermont.”
She unfolded the paper.
“Last week, an independent audit of the house was completed by Sotheby’s. The oil paintings currently hanging in the drawing room—the ones Vanessa claims are portraits of herself and my father—were painted over four authentic 17th-century canvasses to hide them from the estate tax appraisers.”
A gasp erupted from the front row. Several art collectors in attendance leaned forward in horror.
“You’re insane!” Vanessa shrieked. “Thomas, tell her she’s insane!”
Thomas Whitmore didn’t speak. He buried his face in his hands, trembling.
“The jewelry was auctioned off through an anonymous broker in Zurich eight months ago,” Claire continued, her tone never rising above a conversational hum. “And the Vermont timberland? It was leveraged to secure a twelve-million-dollar private loan for Whitmore Fashion Group... a company owned entirely by Vanessa’s daughter from her first marriage.”
Claire turned to look at Vanessa.
“You didn’t just take my mother’s money, Vanessa. You took my brother’s inheritance, my father’s dignity, and you tried to make me pay for the wedding so no one would notice the bank accounts were empty.”
Vanessa looked around the room. The faces staring back at her were no longer amused or scandalized by gossip. They were cold, disgusted, and horrified.
“Get out,” Daniel said.
The room went completely still.
May you like
Daniel took off his boutonnière and threw it onto the head table. He walked over to his sister, taking her hand tightly. He looked at the woman who had spent nine years pretending to be his mother.
“Get out of my wedding,” Daniel said, his voice shaking with pure, righteous anger. “Get out of my mother’s house.”
