Chapter 1 - The Broken Promise
"She’s just a maid’s daughter, Richard. You give her one penny, and you spit on your father’s memory."
Evelyn Vance glared across the mahogany dining table, her voice dropping into that icy, venomous register reserved for family betrayals. "Look at her. She doesn’t even have our blood."
Sitting at the far end of the room, thirty-two-year-old Clara didn't flinch. She had spent fifteen years in the Vance household, first as the quiet girl who helped her mother scrub the marble floors of the estate, and later as the devoted caretaker who changed old Arthur Vance’s bandages while his own children were off squandering his fortune in Paris and New York.
"The will hasn't been unsealed yet, Evelyn," Richard said, rubbing his temples. "We don't even know what Dad left her."
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"I know what he left her!" Evelyn snapped, standing up, her diamond rings clicking against her crystal glass. "He was senile! He was isolated in this crumbling house with a leech who convinced him that his own blood family didn't care about him!"
Clara slowly set down her tea.
