Chapter 3 - THE GLASS SHATTERS
"Ethan!" a voice called out from the patio.
Ethan stepped out into the afternoon light, holding a crystal champagne flute. He was smiling, listening to a joke from a senior investor from Dallas. He looked handsome, sharp, and confident in his custom charcoal suit.
Then his eyes traveled across the lawn.
He looked past the rose arches. He looked past the decorated tables. And then his gaze landed on the center of the lawn—on the soaked woman kneeling in the mud, clutching a cheap grocery bag, drenched in ice water.
The color drained from Ethan’s face so fast he looked as though he had seen a ghost.
The crystal flute slipped from his fingers. It crashed against the stone patio floor with a violent, sharp crack, shattering into a hundred glittering shards. The sound instantly silenced the entire lawn. The laughter died. The murmurs stopped.
"Mother?" Ethan gasped.
The word wasn't a whisper. It was a raw, horrified cry that echoed off the high brick walls of the estate.
Vanessa blinked, confused. She turned toward Ethan with an airy wave of her hand and an awkward, nervous giggle. "Oh, darling! Look at this funny coincidence. Some vagrant wandered in off the street and—"
"Quiet, Vanessa!" Ethan roared.
The sheer fury in his voice made several guests flinch back. He didn't look at Vanessa. He didn't look at her parents. He sprinted across the lawn, paying no attention to the mud ruining his designer leather shoes.
He dropped to his knees right into the dirt beside me. He wrapped his arms around my wet, shivering shoulders, burying his face in my damp plaid shawl.
"Mom... oh God, Mom! What happened to you? Are you hurt?" His voice trembled with sheer agony and terror.
Patricia and George Mitchell shoved their way through the circle of silent onlookers, their faces a mixture of confusion and irritation.
"Ethan, honey, what are you doing?" Patricia demanded, reaching out to pull him away. "Why are you calling a homeless trespasser your mother? That woman is clearly mentally unstable—"
Ethan stood up slowly.
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When he turned to face the Mitchell family, his eyes were burning with a hatred so deep it made George Mitchell instinctively take a step back.
"She is Katherine Carter," Ethan said, his voice ringing across the lawn like a death knell. "The founder and sole owner of Carter Global Holdings. And she is my mother."
