My parents arrived with my sister and a locksmith. Mom said, “She’s divorced. She needs your house more than you do.” Dad held up a paper. “We already handled the legal part. Just give us the keys.” My sister smirked. “I’ll let you pick up your things later.” I stepped aside. “Go ahead. Open it.” Ten minutes later, Dad walked back out white as a sheet. “Who else knows?” / Chapter 24 / 40

Chapter 24 - The Gathering of Wolves

Gerald stared at the cane touching his throat. His entire body shook with tremors so violent that his teeth audibly chattered against each other.

"Constance," Gerald wheezed, blood bubbling from a split lip. "I didn't... I swear to God, I didn't know you were still alive. The papers in Zurich... the lawyers said the trust defaulted to the primary heir after forty years of inactivity! I was just trying to protect the estate!"

"Protect the estate?" Constance’s voice dropped to an arctic register that sent a shiver straight through the foundation of the house. "You pledged the mineral reserves of Elm Ridge to a syndicate of cutthroats out of Bogota to pay off your second mistress's penthouse in Boca Raton. You brought an angle grinder and a locksmith to my sanctuary to rip the lock off my mother's safe."

She applied slight pressure to the cane. Gerald let out a strangled whimper, his hands fluttering helplessly in the air, terrified to touch the silver wood.

"And you," Constance turned her terrifying blue gaze to Eleanor, who shrank into the fetal position against the base of the coat rack. "You spent thirty years pretending to be an aristocrat on money my sister stole from my accounts. You sat in country clubs, looking down your nose at the working girls of this town, while your husband forged my father's signature on deed liens."

"Mom, say something!" Vanessa sobbed, crawling toward Eleanor. "Tell her we can fix it! We can give her the house! We’ll sign whatever she wants!"

"Give her the house?" I interrupted, my voice cutting through their pathetic sniveling like a straight razor.

All four heads turned toward me.

"The house isn't yours to give, Vanessa," I said, stepping into the center of the hall, the shotgun still resting firmly against my hip. "You tried to throw me out on the road yesterday with a suitcase and twenty dollars. You laughed while the locksmith drilled my front deadbolt. You stood on this porch and told me that because you failed at your marriage, you deserved everything I bled to restore."

Vanessa glared at me, a venomous flash of her old spite flaring through the tears. "You shut up! You think you’re special because you stayed here and wiped Grandma's ass while she died? You’re just a maid! You always were!"

*Smack.*

The sound echoed through the high-ceilinged foyer like a gunshot.

Constance’s cane hadn't moved, but her gloved palm had struck Vanessa across the face with the force of an iron bar. Vanessa fell sideways, clutching her split cheek, stunned into dead silence.

"Speak to the lady of the house with respect, you cheap little parasite," Constance said, her voice dropping into deadly calm. "Maeve the younger is the only person in this room with Blackwood steel in her spine. She didn't beg. She didn't steal. She took the hammer and the land, and she stood her ground against three cowards."