Chapter 3 - THE VELVET COAT
“Where did you get this?” I asked, my voice barely a whisper. The silver locket felt heavy in my hand, burning against my skin.
“Clara mailed it to me the night she vanished,” Alexander said, his eyes never leaving Beatrice. “She was terrified. She told me she had made a terrible mistake trusting the Sterlings. By the time I reached her apartment, it was empty. The police called it a disappearance. A year later, they found her coat near the river and declared her dead.”
“This is absurd!” Beatrice finally shrieked, her composed facade shattering into a million jagged pieces. “You are ruining my son’s rehearsal dinner with these insane delusions! Richard, do something!”
Richard lunged for the locket, his face purple with rage. “Give me that piece of trash, Mariana.”
I stepped back, closing my fist around the silver metal. “No.”
“Mariana,” Richard barked, the tone he used when I was a child and had forgotten to polish Sebastian’s shoes. “I will not tell you again. Hand it over. You are embarrassing this family.”
“I’m not part of this family,” I said. The words tasted like ash, but they were the truest thing I had ever spoken. “You just spent twenty-seven years making sure I knew that.”
Sebastian, who had been standing frozen near the bar with Renata, finally marched over. He looked flawless in the tuxedo I had meticulously ironed for him at five in the morning.
“What is going on?” Sebastian demanded, looking between his father and me with disgust. “Mariana, stop causing a scene. You’re ruining my night. Go wait in the car.”
“She’s not going anywhere,” Renata said. She stepped up beside me, her cream-colored dress glowing under the chandeliers. She looked at her father. “Dad, what is happening? Is what you’re saying true?”
“It’s true, Renata,” Alexander said softly. “Mariana is your cousin.”
Sebastian laughed—a harsh, mocking sound. “Mariana? A Vance? Please. She’s a charity case. My parents took pity on her so she wouldn’t rot in an orphanage.”
“Did they?” Alexander turned to Richard. “Or did they take her because my father paid them to?”
The entire room seemed to hold its breath.
I stared at Alexander. “Paid them?”
Alexander nodded slowly. “My father—Clara’s father—was a ruthless man. He hated that Clara fell in love with a struggling artist. When Clara got pregnant, my father cut her off. But he couldn’t stand the embarrassment of an illegitimate grandchild. So, he made a deal with a young, ambitious couple who needed capital to start their real estate business.”
I looked at Richard and Beatrice. The pristine Greenwich estate. The luxury cars. The empire they had built.
“They didn’t rescue me,” I whispered, the horrifying realization washing over me.
“No,” Alexander said. “They were paid three million dollars to take you away from Clara and make sure you never knew who you were.”
“Lies!” Beatrice screamed. “Alexander, you are a pathetic, grieving man making up stories!”
“If it’s a lie, Beatrice,” Alexander challenged, “then explain why you still have Clara’s velvet coat hanging in your private cedar closet.”
My heart stopped.
The cedar closet. The one at the end of the hall in the Greenwich estate. The one Beatrice kept locked with a heavy brass key she wore on a chain around her neck. The closet I had been forbidden to clean, forbidden to even walk past since I was five years old.
I looked at Beatrice. Her hand unconsciously flew to her chest, right over the spot where the key always rested beneath her blouse.
She knew. She had kept it.
I turned on my heel and began walking toward the grand exit of the country club.
“Mariana!” Richard roared. “If you walk out those doors, you are dead to us! You will have nothing!”
I didn’t look back. I pushed through the heavy oak doors and ran into the cool night air, clutching the silver locket so tightly my palm bled. I had to get to the estate. I had to see the closet.
But as I reached the gravel driveway, a pair of headlights flashed. A black sedan swerved in front of me, blocking my path. The doors opened, and two men in dark suits stepped out, their eyes fixed on me.
May you like
“Get in the car, Miss Sterling,” the driver said, pulling back his jacket to reveal a holstered weapon. “Mr. Sterling instructed us to escort you home.”
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