Chapter 8 - THE NIGHT BELLAMY HOUSE LOCKED ITS GATES
Bellamy House was not a house.
It was an estate.
Stone gates.
Fourteen acres.
Private security.
A mansion built before World War I.
Maya arrived at midnight.
For the first time.
Or perhaps the second.
She had lived there as a baby.
She remembered nothing.
Except the orchid fountain.
The moment she saw it, she stopped.
White marble.
Water.
Orchids carved around the basin.
The photograph from her mother’s vault.
Real.
Lily held Maya’s hand.
“Mommy?”
“Yes?”
“Is this our house?”
Maya almost laughed.
“I don’t know yet.”
Evelyn came down the steps.
Victor beside her.
Neither looked happy.
Maya walked toward them.
“Who controls Bellamy tomorrow?”
Victor answered:
“The board votes at nine.”
“On what?”
“Restoring your shares.”
“That sounds good.”
“It is.”
Evelyn continued.
“But whoever holds your proxy controls the new combined voting block until final transfer.”
Maya frowned.
“I didn’t sign a proxy.”
Victor said:
“Someone forged one.”
Of course.
“Name?”
“Richard Vance.”
Maya laughed.
“How can my husband sign my proxy?”
“He can’t.”
“Then why does anyone care?”
“Because it was notarized.”
“By?”
A man stepped from the library.
Dr. Harold Voss.
Maya stared.
“What are you doing here?”
He looked ashamed.
“Trying to correct one more mistake.”
He handed Miriam a document.
The forged proxy relied on an old diagnosis saying Maya lacked capacity under severe psychological distress.
Voss’s own notes.
The same lies he had written when she was sixteen.
Maya whispered:
“They’re using my childhood records to declare me incompetent.”
“Yes.”
“Who filed it?”
Victor answered:
“Charles Sterling’s estate counsel.”
Julian went still.
“Name.”
Victor looked at him.
“Margaret Sterling.”
Julian’s older sister.
Maya stared.
“You have a sister?”
“Yes.”
“Where is she?”
A slow clap came from the staircase.
Everyone looked up.
A woman in her forties descended.
Black dress.
Perfect posture.
Cold smile.
Margaret Sterling.
Julian’s sister.
“Right here.”
Julian stared.
“You?”
She smiled.
“You always were slow with family.”
He stepped forward.
“You recruited Thomas.”
“Yes.”
“Vanessa?”
“Yes.”
“Richard?”
Margaret laughed.
“He recruited himself the moment he asked what the ring was worth.”
Maya went cold.
Margaret looked at her.
“My father spent decades building leverage over Bellamy.”
“Your father tried to kill my mother.”
Margaret’s smile faded.
“My father was many things.”
“That isn’t denial.”
“No.”
She continued.
“When he died, he left a mess.”
“So you continued it.”
“I contained it.”
Julian snapped:
“By stealing two companies?”
Margaret turned.
“By preventing Bellamy from taking ours.”
“The trust was Dad’s.”
“A mistake.”
“It was legal.”
“Law is just another battlefield.”
Maya stepped forward.
“No.”
Margaret looked at her.
“You’re the waitress.”
Maya almost smiled.
“Yes.”
“That’s supposed to insult me?”
Margaret studied her.
“You really don’t understand what you inherited.”
Maya looked around.
Stone walls.
Portraits.
Billions.
People lying for decades.
“I understand enough.”
“What?”
“Everybody who cared this much about controlling it became miserable.”
Silence.
Margaret’s face hardened.
“You won’t survive a month.”
“Maybe.”
Maya shrugged.
“But I survived Richard.”
Victor almost smiled.
Then security rushed in.
“Ms. Bellamy.”
“What?”
“East gate breach.”
Everyone moved.
A vehicle crashed through the side barrier.
Richard’s car.
Not the yacht.
He stumbled out.
Face bruised.
Shirt torn.
Maya ran outside.
“Richard?”
He collapsed.
Police moved toward him.
He gasped:
“They took Vanessa.”
Maya stopped.
“Who?”
“Margaret’s men.”
Everyone turned toward the staircase.
Margaret was gone.
Julian swore.
Richard grabbed Maya’s sleeve.
“She’s going after Lily.”
Maya pulled away.
“Why?”
“The trust.”
“What about it?”
Richard coughed.
“She needs Lily removed from the bloodline.”
Maya froze.
“What does that mean?”
Richard stared.
“She has another Bellamy heir.”
Silence.
Victor went white.
Evelyn whispered:
“No.”
Maya looked at them.
“What?”
Victor sat down.
“My son.”
“You have a son?”
“He died.”
Evelyn closed her eyes.
Victor whispered:
“Or we thought he did.”
Again.
Another dead heir.
Maya almost laughed from exhaustion.
Richard continued.
“Margaret says he’s alive.”
“Where?”
“She wouldn’t tell me.”
Then Lily screamed from inside the mansion.
Maya ran.
The nursery door stood open.
Window broken.
Lily gone.
On the floor lay her stuffed rabbit.
And a white orchid.
Maya picked it up.
A note attached:
ONE HEIRESS FOR ANOTHER.
May you like
Margaret had taken Lily.
And somewhere out there was another Bellamy heir no one had seen in twenty-five years.
