Chapter 7 - The Witness for the Prosecution
Across the table, Marta stared at me as if I were a ghost. Julian looked as though he might physically collapse onto the carpeted floor, his hands trembling so violently he dropped the affidavit back into the folder.
“Claire... please,” Julian whispered, his voice desperate, pathetic, and entirely stripped of its arrogance. “Let’s... let’s not do this here. We can go home. We can talk about this in private. Whatever you want, we’ll negotiate—”
“There is nothing to negotiate, Julian,” I said, picking up my water glass and taking a calm, unhurried sip. “You spent ten years lying to my face, weaponizing your family’s language to mock me in my own home, and plotting to steal a child from its mother while treating my fertility struggles as a pathetic punchline. Our marriage ended the moment your mother opened her mouth last Sunday.”
Before Julian could scramble for another excuse, a tall, elegantly dressed woman walked up to our table.
It was Sophie.
She wore a simple, tasteful emerald-green maternity dress, her five-month baby bump clearly visible beneath the fabric. Her eyes were red-rimmed from crying, but her posture was rigid, supported by a young associate attorney from Sterling & Vance who stood quietly a step behind her.
The entire VIP section of the ballroom went dead silent. Heads turned. Whispers rippled through the surrounding tables like wildfire.
“Hello, Julian,” Sophie said, her voice echoing clearly across the hushed dining room. “I thought I should come introduce myself to your wife properly. After all, according to your mother, we’re going to be co-parenting very soon.”
Helga let out a sharp gasp, turning on Sophie with venom in her eyes. “Du Verräterin! Du hast versprochen—”
“I promised nothing to a woman who treats human beings like cattle,” Sophie snapped back in English, her voice ringing with newfound courage. She turned her gaze to me, her eyes filled with profound remorse. “Claire... I am so, so sorry. He lied to me too. He told me you didn't care about children, that your marriage was already over, and that you would welcome my baby with open arms.”
“I know, Sophie,” I said gently, standing up from my chair and smoothing my velvet dress. I walked around the table and stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the woman my husband had used and discarded. Two women who had both been lied to, manipulated, and underestimated by the von Brandt family—now standing as an unbreakable united front.
“And you’re right,” I continued, looking directly at Julian, who sat frozen in his chair under the blinding glare of the room’s spotlights. “We are going to welcome this baby—into a household completely free of deceit, cruelty, and aristocratic parasites.”
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Arthur Sterling stepped out from the crowd of guests, holding a clipboard with several legal notices. He walked straight up to Julian and dropped a thick packet of divorce papers and emergency financial injunctions directly into his lap.
“Mr. von Brandt,” Arthur said smoothly, his voice carrying effortlessly across the silent hall. “You are officially served. All corporate assets, joint bank accounts, and real estate holdings are frozen effective immediately pending court adjudication.”
