The estate attorney set his leather briefcase flat on the marble table, snapping the brass locks open with a sharp click.
Arthur: Mrs. Sterling, I have served a copy of the emergency restraining order to your legal counsel as well.
Victoria: A restraining order? Against me? In my own home?
Arthur: The property is registered under the Sterling Family Heritage Trust. You hold zero equity in this deed.
Victoria: That's preposterous! Julian, call off your bulldog!
Julian: Arthur doesn't answer to you, Victoria. And neither do I.
Arthur pulled a blue folder from his case, flipping to a tabbed section filled with medical charts.
Arthur: Furthermore, we received the full audit from Saint Jude's Women's Center this morning.
Clara looked up, her fingers tightening on Maya's swaddling cloth.
Clara: The clinic sent records here?
Arthur: They sent them directly to Mr. Sterling's legal office under court subpoena, Clara.
Victoria: That medical facility violated privacy laws! I'll have their license revoked!
Julian: Let him finish, Victoria. You might want to hear this part.
Arthur adjusted his glasses, scanning down the second page with a calm, clinical gaze.
Arthur: According to the facility administrator, Mrs. Sterling visited the maternity ward three days ago while Clara was still heavily medicated following delivery.
Clara: You were there? But... the nurse said nobody came except the chaplain.
Arthur: Mrs. Sterling presented herself as the child's legal guardian to hospital administration.
Julian: She told them Clara had signed over temporary custody before labor.
Victoria: She was an employee on our insurance policy! I had to manage the paperwork!
Arthur: You attempted to discharge the infant directly to a private transport courier without the mother's presence.
Clara gasped, pulling Maya up against her neck, burying her face into the infant's hair.
Clara: You were going to take her before I even woke up? Before I could hold her?
Victoria: You weren't fit! You had complications, you couldn't even stand!
Arthur: The only reason the courier was turned away was because the attending pediatrician noted discrepancies in the signature line.
Julian: Because you couldn't even forge Clara's handwriting properly, could you?
Victoria's hands began to shake violently, the gold phone clattering onto the grand piano keys with a jarring discordant crash.
Victoria: Julian, please. Listen to me for one minute.
Julian: I have listened to you lie for three years. I'm done.
Victoria: I did it for us! We can't have children, Julian! You know what the fertility specialists said!
The room dropped into an uncomfortable, suffocating silence.
Julian didn't blink, but his expression hardened into cold, unbreakable granite.
Julian: Is that what this was about? You wanted to buy a baby to save your marriage?
Victoria: If we adopted privately, your family would stop pressuring us about an heir! You would stop looking at me like I failed you!
Julian: I never once blamed you for that, Victoria. Never.
Victoria: You wanted a child! The board wanted a successor!
Julian: I wanted a honest partner! Not a monster who steals a baby from an orphaned girl who trusted us!
Victoria: She couldn't raise that child anyway! Look at her! She has nothing!
Julian: She has everything you don't have. A heart, a conscience, and real love for that child.
Arthur pulled another sheet of paper from the briefcase and turned toward Victoria.
Arthur: Mrs. Sterling, two uniformed county deputies are currently waiting in the guest driveway.
Victoria gasped, stepping back against the piano.
Victoria: Deputies? You called the police on me?
Arthur: You have forty-five minutes to collect your essential personal effects under deputy supervision, or you will be escorted off the grounds in custody.
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