Chapter 2 - Midnight Standoff
I didn't press the unlock button. Instead, I grabbed my phone, synced to the intercom system, and spoke in a voice devoid of emotion. "You are trespassing, Julian. Leave my property before I call the police."
On the monitor, Julian looked up at the camera lens, his jaw clenched so tightly I could see the muscle ticking. "Clara, open the door. We need to talk about what happened at the restaurant. You cannot hide my children from me."
"Your children?" I scoffed through the speaker, pacing the hardwood floor of my office. "You forfeited the right to use that word five years ago when you let your mother’s fixers throw my clothes into a dumpster while I was fighting for my life in the ICU."
"I didn't know!" he shouted into the intercom, his voice cracking with an emotion I had never heard from the ruthless CEO—desperation. "Clara, swear to me. My mother told me you miscarried. She showed me forged hospital records with your signature saying you wanted a clean break. Victoria was there when they brought the files to my office!"
I stopped pacing. Hearing him say it out loud confirmed what I had suspected for half a decade: his mother, Eleanor Vance, and his fiancée, Victoria, had orchestrated a masterpiece of deception. But his ignorance did not excuse his abandonment. He should have looked harder. He should have come to the hospital himself.
"Ignorance isn't innocence, Julian," I replied coldly. "You chose to believe a piece of paper over the woman you married. Now go home to your heiress."
"I am not leaving without a DNA test," he demanded, pressing his palm against the heavy glass of the front door. "If they are mine, I will fight for them in every court in New York."
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"Try it," I whispered into the microphone, my eyes flashing with fierce maternal fury. "You have billions, Julian. But I have the truth. And if you drag my children into a courtroom, I will destroy your family name before the ink dries on your petition. Goodnight."
I severed the connection, turned off the monitor, and sat in the dark, knowing the war had only just begun.
