Chapter 6 - Victoria Wanted Laura To React
Victoria’s confession did not make Laura calmer.
“You wore my mother’s necklace to provoke me?”
“I believed your mother stole it from mine.”
“So you wanted to humiliate me publicly.”
Victoria looked down.
“Yes.”
Charles shook his head.
“You told me you found it in your jewelry safe.”
“I lied.”
The gala itself had honored women’s shelters.
Victoria chose that night deliberately.
She wanted Laura to recognize the pearls.
She wanted the Bennett family embarrassed in the same room where
Victoria believed Margaret had once been dishonored.
Laura laughed bitterly.
“You inherited a forty-year-old fight and decided to hand it to our
daughters.”
Victoria flinched.
That landed.
Sophie returned with hot chocolate and immediately sensed the room had
changed.
“Are we still mad?”
Laura looked at Victoria.
“Yes.”
Victoria answered at the same time.
“Yes.”
Sophie nodded.
“At least nobody’s lying about that.”
Henry almost smiled.
Then his assistant entered carrying a document box.
The foundation maintained records from former Rose House residents
because the memorial fund later merged into Caldwell’s charity.
Inside was a sealed envelope Eleanor had deposited ten years earlier.
One year before she died.
It was addressed:
TO MARGARET, OR TO OUR DAUGHTERS IF WE NEVER FIX THIS.
Laura stopped breathing.
Victoria stared.
Henry had never opened it because both women had instructed him not to
unless they reconciled or both died.
Margaret died first.
Eleanor never requested the letter back.
Then Henry forgot it existed until tonight.
Laura and Victoria opened it together.
Inside was not a confession.
It was a bank statement.
A Bellweather Services account.
And a handwritten note:
Margaret, I finally know who moved the money.
May you like
The next line stunned everyone.
It was not Edward.
