The clasp gave way, and the heavy diamond bracelet dropped to the altar runner with a muted metallic click.
Juliet stood stripped of her dignity, her expensive French veil hanging crooked across her shoulders like a spider's web.
Juliet: You think you've won, Caroline? You have nothing! You spent fourteen months in an insane asylum! Nobody on Wall Street will ever trust you to run a multi-million-dollar shipping line!
Caroline: The board of directors held an emergency session via teleconference two hours ago, Juliet.
Arthur Hayes pulled a certified corporate resolution from his inside coat pocket and held it out for the guests to see.
Attorney Hayes: By unanimous vote of the board, Caroline Mercer has been reinstated as full majority owner and chief executive officer of Mercer Logistics, effective immediately.
Marcus Mercer: And I have agreed to serve as her senior advisor and chairman of the executive committee until she feels completely settled.
Juliet: You can't do this to me! I have an executive employment contract! I am entitled to a golden parachute severance package!
Attorney Hayes: Clause twenty-two of that contract explicitly terminates all financial compensation in the event of gross felony misconduct involving company assets.
Caroline bent down, picked up her mother's wedding band and her eighteenth-birthday bracelet from the white runner, and slipped them onto her wrist.
Caroline: You took fourteen months of my life, Juliet. You made me sleep on cold concrete and you told the world I was buried in an unmarked grave.
Caroline turned to the two state troopers waiting quietly behind her.
Caroline: Officer Miller, take her into custody. She is a flight risk with hidden bank accounts in Switzerland.
Officer Miller: Turn around and place your hands behind your back, Mrs. Vance.
Juliet: Don't touch me! Do you know who I am? I have dinner with the state governor every Thanksgiving!
Officer Miller took Juliet’s wrist in a firm grip, twisting her arms behind her back with practiced efficiency.
The cold steel handcuffs clicked shut around Juliet's bare, lace-draped wrists, the harsh metallic sound echoing through the solemn chapel.
Juliet: Marcus, help me! Tell them this is a misunderstanding! Call my personal attorney!
Marcus: The only call you need to make, Juliet, is to a public defender. Because after Caroline’s lawyers finish auditing the company books, you won't have a single dollar left to pay for private counsel.
The guests in the pews parted like the Red Sea as Officer Miller marched the screaming bride down the center aisle, her white satin hem dragging across the dirtied marble floor.
Juliet: Caroline! You will regret this! I will get out on bail by sunset!
Caroline: The federal judge denied bail an hour ago, Juliet. You are going straight to the state penitentiary holding wing.
The heavy chapel doors swung shut behind Juliet's fading wails, leaving the sanctuary in dead, breathless quiet.
Marcus pulled Caroline into a tight, trembling embrace, his tears soaking into the shoulder of her worn hospital gown.
Marcus: I am so sorry we didn't search harder, Caroline. We thought you were gone forever.
Caroline: I'm home now, Uncle Marcus. And the Mercer family business stays right where my father built it.
Caroline looked up at the sunlight streaming through the stained-glass windows, breathing clean air for the first time in over a year.
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