Chapter 8 - The House of Cards Collapses
The dawn before the Friday hearing arrived with a thin, iron-gray mist that crawled off the Rocky Mountains and settled over the town of Hot Sulphur Springs, the county seat of Grand County.
Victor Pike sat in the front seat of his Mercedes sedan in the courthouse parking lot, the engine idling to keep the heater running. His hair was unwashed, his jaw covered in a rough, silver stubble.
Beside him, Clara looked ten years older than she had on the night of the birthday dinner. She had stopped wearing her rings; her fingers looked bare and wrinkled against her fabric coat.
"Victor, the lawyer said we should look for a settlement," she whispered, staring at the brick facade of the district court. "He said if we give Elena the cabin and pay Vanguard back their deposit over ten years, the state might drop the criminal fraud charge."
"With what money, Clara?" Victor snarled, his voice hollow and exhausted. "Vanguard didn't just sue us; they got a temporary receivership over the insurance office. I went to log into the corporate portal yesterday, and my credentials were deleted. The receiver has already taken control of the commissions. We don't have ten years of payments. We don't even have the money for next month's mortgage on the house."
"What about Brianna?" Clara asked, her voice cracking. "She’s supposed to leave for freshman orientation next week."
"Brianna can go to the local community college and get a job at the diner," Victor said, his eyes fixed on the rear-view mirror. "Because right now, if we don't win this hearing, I'm going to a place where the rooms don't have ocean views."
A black SUV pulled into the parking lot, followed immediately by two large, silver pickup trucks.
Victor watched as the doors opened.
I stepped out of the SUV, wearing my full Army Class A dress uniform—the dark blue jacket immaculate, the gold braid gleaming on the sleeves, the ribbons on my chest aligned to the millimeter. Behind me, Ben Ramirez and five other retired veterans stepped out of the trucks, all of them in their dress uniforms, their faces solemn, their shoulders square.
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Clara gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. "Look at her... Victor, look at her."
Victor didn't say a word. He watched his stepdaughter walk toward the courthouse steps, surrounded by a wall of blue and green wool, her boots striking the asphalt with the synchronized, rhythmic snap of a platoon on the march. She didn't look at the Mercedes. She didn't look at her mother. She walked up the stone steps like she owned the mountain itself.
