Chapter 5 - The Confrontation
The next morning, the house was a hive of federal investigators. The news had leaked—the 'Pretty Lady' who had tried to murder the Whitmore matriarch was the talk of every news channel in Chicago.
Rosa was called into the grand study. Nathaniel was sitting at his desk, but he wasn't alone. A high-powered attorney sat across from him, and Sophie was perched on a velvet chair nearby, coloring with crayons.
"Rosa," Nathaniel said, gesturing to a seat. "Vivian is fighting back. She claims the child is unreliable and that you coerced her into saying those things. She’s claiming you and I are conspiring to frame her to get out of our engagement."
"She’s desperate," Rosa said.
"She is dangerous," Nathaniel corrected. "She has copies of my private ledgers. She’s threatening to release them to the press unless I drop all charges and allow her to leave the country with a 'severance package.'"
Rosa leaned forward. "If you let her go, she’ll just do this to someone else. She doesn't care about the money or the marriage. She cares about control. And she will never stop until she destroys everything that doesn't belong to her."
Sophie looked up from her paper, her blue eyes wide. "She was mean to the kitty too," she piped up.
The room went silent. Rosa stood up and walked over to the child. "Sophie, honey, did you see where she put the cane?"
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Sophie stood up and walked to a heavy cabinet in the corner of the room. She pointed to a hidden panel behind a row of encyclopedias. "She put it behind the books. So nobody could see it."
Nathaniel stood, his face darkening. He strode over and pushed the books aside. There, shoved into the dark recess of the wall, was Margaret’s silver-headed cane, stained with a dark, dried substance near the base. It wasn't just a prop; it was the weapon.
