Chapter 8 - The Mask Slips
Victoria sat sprawled on the hardwood floor, surrounded by broken glass and the dark, steaming puddle of poisoned tea. Her silk blouse was torn at the cuff, her immaculate hair disheveled.
For three seconds, she tried to cling to the illusion.
“Marcus, please!” she sobbed, tears flowing freely down her cheeks, her voice pitching into hysterical grief. “It’s a mistake! It was just chamomile and herbal supplements! I was only trying to cure her! You’ve lost your mind—the stress of her blindness has made you psychotic!”
Superintendent Mensah stepped forward, holding up an evidence bag containing the amber dropper bottle retrieved from the kitchen pantry. Beside him, an officer brought in an iPad displaying the live feed of the arrest occurring simultaneously across town.
On the screen, Dr. Asante, the disgraced apothecary owner, was being hauled out of his compounding pharmacy in handcuffs, screaming and babbling confessions to avoid life imprisonment.
Victoria’s sobs abruptly cut off.
The transformation was chilling. The weeping, desperate wife vanished. Her posture straightened. Her expression went completely blank, cold, and dead. She wiped the tears from her cheek with the back of her hand and let out a dry, venomous chuckle.
“You think you’re so brilliant, don't you, Marcus?” she said, her voice dropping into a flat, aristocratic drawl. “You arrogant, self-righteous bastard.”
Marcus held Lila against his chest, shielding the little girl’s face against his shoulder. “Why, Victoria? Why Lila?”
Victoria sneered, rising slowly to her feet despite the tactical officers keeping their assault rifles trained on her chest.
“Because you loved her more than anything,” Victoria spat, venom dripping from every syllable. “You married me to be a decorative accessory on your arm! You parade me at your charity galas, you buy me diamonds, but you look at me like I’m an employee. Everything—every single penny of the Bennett empire—was earmarked for this pathetic, weak little girl.”
She glared at Lila with pure disgust.
“Sarah died, and yet her ghost still owned this house! I gave you two years of my youth! I played the doting stepmother while you buried yourself in your spreadsheets! I deserved that trust, Marcus! Four hundred million dollars. If she had just gone completely blind quietly, I would have taken care of her. She would have had nurses, tutors, a comfortable little life in the country. But you had to hire foreign doctors. You had to keep digging.”
She took a step toward Marcus, her eyes wild with malice.
“You’re too late anyway! Her optic nerves are dead! You can lock me away, Marcus, but every time you look into those blank, milky eyes of hers for the rest of your miserable life, you will remember me! You will remember that I took the light from her, and there’s not enough money on earth to buy it back!”
Marcus didn't blink. He didn't raise his voice. He looked at her with pure, unadulterated contempt.
“You underestimated two things, Victoria,” Marcus said softly.
Victoria frowned, thrown off by his absolute calm. “What?”
“First, you underestimated the courage of a ten-year-old boy you thought was beneath your notice.”
Marcus signaled Mensah, who clamped heavy steel handcuffs around Victoria’s wrists with a sharp, echoing *click*.
May you like
“And second,” Marcus added, his voice ringing with absolute certainty, “you underestimated the scientist who synthesized your poison.”
***
