Chapter 3 - THE SKELETONS OF BEATRICE VANCE
While Julian stood paralyzed on the downtown pavement, I walked into the private conference room of the Hayes Law Firm. Beatrice Vance was already waiting there, escorted by her personal attorney, glaring at me with incandescent fury.
"You ungrateful little peasant," Beatrice hissed the moment I took my seat at the head of the marble table. "You think you can lock us out of our ancestral home and freeze our family lineage?"
"Ancestral home?" I laughed softly, sliding a yellowed manila folder across the polished stone surface toward her trembling hands. "You might want to read the certified county records from thirty-five years ago, Beatrice."
Beatrice’s sneer faltered as she pulled out the first document, which was a certified birth certificate and a sealed probate disposition. Her bloodless lips parted, but not a single sound came out of her throat.
"Julian is not Arthur Vance’s biological son," I said, leaning forward so my voice was a chilling whisper. "Thirty-five years ago, when your wealthy husband died without a male heir, you faked a pregnancy in a private Swiss clinic and adopted an orphan to steal the family trust."
"That’s a lie!" Beatrice screamed, her voice cracking as her attorney frantically skimmed the attached hospital logs. "Arthur’s estate was settled decades ago!"
"It was settled on fraudulent grounds," Carter Hayes announced, placing a certified DNA comparison report on top of the stack. "We exhumed Arthur Vance’s genetic profile with judicial permission last month, and there is a zero percent biological match to Julian."
"And that's not even your darkest sin, is it, Beatrice?" I added, watching the matriarch's hands shake so violently she dropped her reading glasses. "You spent thirty-five years abusing everyone around you to hide the fact that you are an imposter living on stolen wealth."
"You destroyed my son!" Beatrice shrieked, slamming both palms on the conference table. "He gave you two children!"
"And you smashed my daughter’s birthday cake because you thought her gender made her worthless," I replied, standing up to my full height. "You created a monster in Julian, and you taught him to treat women like disposable pawns in your fake empire."
May you like
Just then, the conference room television flickered on, displaying a live broadcast from the downtown district attorney’s press room. The chief prosecutor was announcing the immediate unsealing of thirteen felony arrest warrants targeting the Vance executive circle.
Beatrice collapsed backward into her leather armchair, clutching her chest as her tailored facade unraveled completely. The matriarch who had demanded everyone kneel before her false bloodline was now staring into the abyss of total public ruin.
