Chapter 7 - The Eviction
At four o’clock that afternoon, three black Cadillac Escalades pulled into the circular driveway of the Vale Manor in Greenwich.
Celeste Vale was standing in the marble foyer, screaming into her mobile phone while two domestic workers quietly packed her vintage luggage.
“I don’t care if the private jet charter was canceled!” Celeste shrieked. “Charge it to the American Express Centurion! What do you mean, invalid card? Try it again, you incompetent fool!”
The front doors of the estate swung open.
Celeste spun around, her face twisted in rage, ready to unleash her venom on whoever had dared enter without ringing.
Her breath died in her throat.
I walked in, flanked by Carter Vance and two uniformed sheriff’s deputies from Fairfield County.
Behind us, four men in navy blue jumpsuits carrying large, heavy-duty packing crates entered through the double doors.
“What is the meaning of this?” Celeste demanded, her voice shaking as she clutched a diamond-encrusted brooch to her chest. “Mara? How dare you bring these people into my home! Victor is dealing with the lawyers right now! When he finishes with you, you will be on the street where you belong!”
“Celeste,” I said, stepping onto the marble floor.
My eyes drifted to the gift table in the corner of the grand ballroom—the table that had broken my fall yesterday. The shattered cake had been cleaned up, but a faint, dark smudge of my blood was still visible on the white-and-gold wallpaper near the baseboard.
“This hasn’t been your home since 2021,” I said evenly. “Victor pledged the deed to the Greenwich estate as secondary collateral for the mezzanine bridge loan. The Ashford Trust has taken physical possession of the property under an expedited order of foreclosure granted by Judge Martinez two hours ago.”
The senior sheriff’s deputy stepped forward, holding out a sealed court order.
“Mrs. Celeste Vale?” the deputy asked.
“Don’t you dare address me!” Celeste shrieked, backing away from the paper as if it were coated in arsenic. “Do you know who my family is? My great-grandfather founded the Greenwich Country Club!”
“Then I suggest you ask him if you can sleep on the eighth green tonight,” Naomi said, walking in behind me with a clipboard. “Because as of 4:00 PM, you are trespassing on private property owned by Ashford Holdings LLC.”
“You have forty-five minutes to gather your personal clothing,” the deputy said, his voice entirely devoid of sympathy. “Jewelry, art, and furniture are subject to the active creditor lien and may not be removed from the premises until a forensic inventory is completed.”
“Jewelry?” Celeste gasped, her hand flying to her throat where a six-strand pearl necklace rested. “These are family heirlooms! These belonged to Adrian’s grandmother!”
“Purchased with corporate funds in 1998,” Carter Vance noted dryly, consulting his iPad. “Classified as corporate art inventory on your tax filings to avoid luxury sales tax. Therefore, they are corporate assets. Remove them, Mrs. Vale, and the deputies will arrest you for grand larceny on the front lawn.”
Celeste looked at Carter, then at the deputies, and finally at me.
For the first time in the three years I had known her, the icy, imperious mask slipped completely off her face. Beneath it was nothing but a terrified, aging woman who had never worked an hour in her life, whose entire existence had been built on a foundation of borrowed money, stolen labor, and suffocating cruelty.
“Mara,” she pleaded, her voice dropping into a desperate, sickening whine. “Mara, please. We took you in. When Adrian brought you home, we welcomed you. We gave you our name! How can you be so heartless to the family of your child?”
I stopped in front of her.
I looked into her pale, desperate eyes—the same eyes that had watched me lying on this very marble floor yesterday, bleeding, clutching my eight-month belly, while she clapped and warned her husband about the press outside.
“When I was lying there yesterday,” I whispered, leaning in until she could smell the antiseptic on my skin, “my baby’s heart was stopping. And your only concern was the carpet.”
Celeste’s lips trembled. She took a step back.
“You have forty minutes left,” I told her. “I suggest you start with the shoes.”
May you like
I turned my back on her and walked toward the grand staircase, leaving her standing in the middle of her empty, beautiful foyer, weeping tears that nobody would ever care to dry.
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