Chapter 5 - THE INVITATION TO MY OWN FUNERAL
The next four days were a blur of meticulous, cold-blooded preparation. If I was going to walk into the lion’s den, I could not walk in as the victim they threw to the sharks. I had to walk in as the apex predator.
Marcus utilized his old underworld contacts to secure a few essential items. First, a fake identification and a burner phone. Second, a dress. I had told him exactly what I needed. Not the innocent, muted tones Evan preferred me to wear. Not the soft pinks or the sage greens. I needed armor.
When Marcus returned to the boathouse on Wednesday evening, he unzipped a garment bag and revealed a stunning, floor-length gown. It was a deep, liquid crimson silk, plunging at the neckline, with a sharp, elegant silhouette. It was the color of blood, the color of vengeance, a vibrant, screaming contrast to the dark green ocean they had tried to drown me in.
“It’s perfect,” I said, running my fingers over the fabric.
“I also got you this,” Marcus said, handing me a small, encrypted USB drive. “Every file, every offshore transfer, every email between Evan and the arms dealers. It’s all here. I’ve programmed it to auto-run the moment it’s plugged into a system. It will override their audiovisual displays and broadcast the evidence to every screen in the room.”
“And the audio?” I asked.
“Cleaned up and enhanced,” Marcus confirmed.
Before I fell, when I was standing outside the salon doors, I had reached into my clutch and pressed record on my phone’s voice memo app. I wanted proof of Vivien and Sloan’s cruelty regarding the trust. The phone had gone into the ocean with me, but Marcus, a master of tech recovery, had spent days extracting the data from the waterlogged memory chip. He had salvaged the entire conversation. Vivien discussing my murder. Sloan mocking my unborn child. Evan admitting his crimes before he pried my fingers off the rail.
It was a symphony of their guilt.
On Thursday night, the eve of the gala, the psychological weight of what I was about to do finally settled over me. I sat in a rocking chair in the corner of the boathouse, holding Leo tightly against my chest. The humid swamp air hummed with the sound of cicadas.
“I’m going to leave you for a few hours tomorrow, my sweet boy,” I whispered, kissing the soft crown of his head. My tears fell, hot and silent, dampening his dark hair. “I hate to leave you, even for a second. But Mommy has to go slay the dragons. I have to make sure they can never, ever hurt us again.”
Leo cooed softly, reaching a tiny hand up to grasp my finger. His grip was surprisingly strong. He was my anchor. He was the reason I didn't let the Atlantic claim me.
Marcus stepped out of the shadows, holding two cups of black coffee. He set one on the table beside me. “He’ll be safe with me, Clare. I’ll guard him with my life. I have the trawler fueled and ready to go. If anything goes wrong at the gala, if they try to silence you before you can make the reveal, you hit the panic button on your phone. I’ll take the boy to international waters, and I’ll send the files to the FBI myself.”
“Nothing will go wrong,” I said, looking up at him, my tears drying. “They think they are untouchable, Marcus. Arrogance is their blind spot. They won’t be looking for a dead woman.”
Friday arrived with a heavy, oppressive heat that felt like a warning. By six in the evening, I was ready. I slipped into the crimson gown. It fit like a second skin. I pulled my hair back into a sleek, severe style, entirely unlike the loose, romantic curls Evan used to demand I wear. I applied dark, dramatic makeup, masking the exhaustion of a new mother and highlighting the sharp, predatory angles of a woman back from the grave.
I looked in the mirror one last time. I didn't recognize the woman staring back. And that was exactly the point. Evan Whitmore’s naive wife was dead. The woman in the mirror was her ghost, and she was furious.
I kissed Leo one last time, inhaling the sweet, milky scent of him, letting it fortify my resolve.
“Bring them down,” Marcus said, handing me the USB drive, which I slipped into a hidden pocket in the gown.
“I’ll leave them in ashes,” I promised.
I drove a rented, nondescript sedan toward Palm Beach, the city lights glittering on the horizon like false promises. The Breakers resort loomed in the distance, a sprawling, magnificent fortress of old money and power. The driveway was lined with luxury cars, valets running frantically, and women in diamonds kissing the air.
I pulled into a secondary service lot, slipping out of the car. I knew the layout of The Breakers well; Evan and I had attended dozens of charity functions here. I bypassed the main security checkpoint, moving through the kitchen service corridors with the confidence of someone who belonged. The staff, busy carrying silver trays of champagne, barely glanced at the woman in the red dress moving like a shadow through the back halls.
I reached the audiovisual control room overlooking the massive Venetian Ballroom. It was empty, the technician likely taking a smoke break before the speeches began. I locked the door behind me. I looked out through the tinted glass window into the ballroom.
It was a sickening display of opulent hypocrisy. Massive white floral arrangements covered every table. Ice sculptures of angels wept melting water into silver basins. A massive portrait of me, taken during our honeymoon, stood on an easel at the front of the room. I looked so happy in that picture. So foolishly, blindingly happy.
And there, standing near the stage, was my husband. Evan was holding a glass of scotch, accepting condolences from a group of banking executives. He looked solemn, tragic, playing the grieving widower to absolute perfection. A few feet away, Vivien held court, dressed in mourning black, though she wore a triumphant smirk she couldn't entirely hide.
And then I saw Sloan. She was wearing a plunging black dress. But it wasn't the dress that made my blood boil. It was what was around her neck. She was wearing my grandmother’s diamond necklace. The one Evan had told me was locked in the family vault for safekeeping.
May you like
A cold, lethal calm washed over me. I plugged the USB drive into the main projection mainframe. The prompt flashed on the screen: READY TO EXECUTE.
I took a deep breath, smoothing the silk of my crimson gown. I unlocked the control room door and stepped out into the VIP hallway. It was time to attend my funeral.
