Chapter 7 - The Accusation
Chloe reached Julian’s side, throwing herself against his chest before pulling back to hold her smartphone directly between them.
Her hazel eyes were wild, illuminated by the harsh blue glare of the high-definition display screen.
"Dad! Don't listen to a single word she says!" Chloe screamed, her voice cracking with the unbearable trauma of the last ten minutes.
Julian caught his daughter’s trembling shoulders, feeling the violent tremors racking her slender frame.
"Chloe, honey, calm down, what are you talking about?" Julian pleaded, his eyes searching her terrified face for sanity.
"She tried to kill me, Dad! She chased me down this entire hallway with that hammer!" Chloe cried, pointing back at the steel tool on the marble.
Julian’s eyes darted toward the weapon, then slowly drifted to the shattered doorframe near the suite entrance.
The deep, brutal gouge in the mahogany was precisely at the height of Chloe’s head.
Julian’s breath hitched in his throat, a cold spike of dread piercing through his chest.
"That... that's impossible," Julian stammered, his mind instinctively rejecting the horrific puzzle pieces snapping into place.
"My mother wouldn't... she couldn't even lift that thing," Julian murmured, staring at Evelyn across the hallway.
"She swung it at my skull, Julian!" Victoria’s voice cut in, cold and razor-sharp as she walked toward her husband.
"If I hadn't come out of that bedroom when I did, your daughter would be lying in a pool of blood right now," Victoria said.
Evelyn straightened up against the wall, her eyes flashing with a desperate, cornered malice.
"They're lying to you, Julian! Chloe stole something from my private suite, and when I confronted her, they attacked me!" Evelyn shouted.
"I didn't steal anything, Dad!" Chloe yelled back, thrusting the phone inches from Julian’s eyes.
"I saw what she did at the banquet! I saw her sneak behind the main serving station before the toast!" Chloe revealed.
Evelyn’s face instantly drained of all color, turning into a ghostly, translucent mask of absolute dread.
"Shut your mouth, Chloe!" Evelyn shrieked, dropping all pretense of frailty as she lunged forward.
Victoria stepped into Evelyn’s path with a vicious glare that froze the matriarch in her tracks.
"Let her speak, Evelyn," Julian whispered, his voice suddenly hollow, stripped of all warmth.
"What did you see, Chloe?" Julian asked, his dark tie loosening in his trembling hand as he looked at his daughter.
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Chloe tapped the glowing glass screen with a trembling thumb.
"Look at the screen, Dad," Chloe whispered, her tears falling onto the illuminated display. "Just look at what your mother did."
