Chapter 2 - The Calm Before the Storm
The ride back to their modest Brooklyn apartment was agonizingly silent. Clara held Mia tightly in the back of the cab, pressing a makeshift ice pack—a bag of frozen peas wrapped in a towel—against the little girl’s cheek.
"Does it still hurt, baby?" Clara whispered, kissing the top of Mia's head.
Mia nodded against Clara’s chest. "Why did she hit me, Mommy? I just wanted to help."
"Because she’s a very sick, unhappy woman," Clara said fiercely. "And I promise you, she will never, ever come near you again."
Once Mia was finally asleep in her small bed, clutching her favorite stuffed bear, Clara went to the kitchen and poured herself a glass of cheap tap water. Her hands were shaking so badly she could barely hold the glass.
The secret she had weaponized tonight had been a burden she’d carried for seven years. While married to Eleanor’s son, Julian, Clara had accidentally discovered a hidden safe containing medical records and a blackmail file. Julian Sterling, the golden boy and CEO of Sterling Enterprises, was not the biological son of the late Richard Sterling. Eleanor had had an affair with a staff member. Julian was illegitimate. If Richard’s board of directors, or his true heir—his estranged older son from his first marriage, Arthur—ever found out, Eleanor and Julian would be left with nothing.
Clara had kept quiet, trading her silence for a quick, undisputed divorce and sole custody of Mia, walking away without a dime just to escape their toxicity. But tonight, Eleanor had broken the truce.
Clara’s phone buzzed on the counter. It was an unknown number.
She answered cautiously. "Hello?"
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"You made a very grave mistake tonight, Clara," Julian’s cold, smooth voice slithered through the speaker. "My mother is hysterical. Whatever lie you whispered to her, you will take it back, or I will crush you. I’ll take Mia. I have the lawyers and the judges to do it."
Clara’s grip on the phone tightened. "Try it, Julian. You touch one hair on my daughter's head, and I will burn your entire empire to the ground." She hung up, blocking the number. The war had begun.
