Chapter 13 - The Unraveling Train
While Claire and Adrian built a new life among the blueprints and timber logs of the restored mills, Vanessa Reid sat on a sagging velvet sofa in her cramped Astoria studio, staring at a blank television screen.
The ivory cathedral train—which she had managed to smuggle out of the estate through a side laundry chute before the state troopers arrived—lay piled in the corner of her living room like a discarded mountain of dirty snow. The thousands of hand-sewn pearls had begun to fall off, rolling across the linoleum floor like stray teeth.
Her phone buzzed on the coffee table.
It was a text from an unsaved number—a debt collector representing the high-end boutique where she had rented the matching emerald jewelry for the wedding day.
May you like
Vanessa didn't pick it up. She reached down, picked up a single pearl from the floor, and squeezed it between her thumb and forefinger until her knuckle turned white.
She had wanted everything Claire had. She had wanted the name, the money, the grand estate overlooking the river, the adoring husband with the ancestral pedigree. And she had ended up with nothing more than a ruined dress that didn't fit her, a frozen bank account, and the terrifying realization that she was entirely, permanently alone.
