Chapter 2 - The Queen Mother's Smile
The name hung in the air like poison gas. Grandma.
Eleanor D'Angelo did not flinch. Seated in the VIP gallery overlooking the ballroom, my mother adjusted her diamond choker with fingers that did not tremble. For forty years, Eleanor had ruled the D'Angelo shipping empire with an iron fist wrapped in velvet lace. When my wife, Clara, had supposedly fled with Sophie three years ago, Eleanor had been the one to comfort me, to wipe my tears, to whisper that some women are simply born without souls.
"Security," I whispered, though the word sounded like a roar in my ears.
My head of security, Marcus, was already at my elbow, his face pale. "Mr. D'Angelo, the doors are locked. No one leaves."
"Lock the estate down," I said, never breaking eye contact with my daughter, who was now clinging to my lap as if I were a raft in the middle of a dark ocean. "Nobody leaves this building until I find out how a child who was supposed to be across an ocean was living in my own backyard."
I scooped Sophie into my arms. She weighed almost nothing—far too light for a three-year-old. Her ribs pressed against my forearm like dry twigs. When she buried her face in my neck, her breath smelled of dust and stale water.
I stood up and turned toward the gallery. Eleanor was descending the curved grand staircase now, her heels clicking rhythmically against the stone. Her silver hair was coiffed to perfection; her emerald silk gown swept behind her like a royal train. She looked at Sophie with a cold, analytical gaze—the same look she gave failing business acquisitions.
"Roman, darling," Eleanor said smoothly, stopping three steps above us. "What a dreadful scene. You are making a spectacle of the foundation's annual gala. Take the beggar child to the nursery and let security deal with her."
The ballroom collective breath hitched.
"Beggar child?" I repeated, my voice dropping into an icy register that made my own lawyers step back. "Mother. Look at her face. Look at her eyes. She has my mother's eyes—no, she has your eyes."
Eleanor tilted her chin. "Senility makes children imagine things, Roman. The girl is clearly a plant. A vulgar stunt orchestrated by Clara's family to extract a settlement."
"Clara is dead," I said softly, stepping closer to the stairs. "Or at least, that is what you told me after her car went off the cliff in Maine. You handled the funeral, Mother. You had the closed casket."
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Eleanor’s eyes flashed—just for a fraction of a second, a tiny fracture in her glacial mask. "Are you accusing me, Roman? In front of our peers?"
"I am not accusing you," I said, my grip tightening around my daughter's trembling body. "I am telling you that you have five seconds to explain why my daughter spent the last three years locked in the basement of this very estate before I forget you gave birth to me."
