In the sixth year of our long-distance relationship, I lied to my boyfriend about missing his birthday, boarded a ten-hour flight with the deed to a condo in my purse, and landed believing I was about to give him the happiest surprise of his life.
Chapter 3
The Grand St. Regis ballroom glittered with chandeliers, white orchids, champagne, and the quiet arrogance of people accustomed to living above consequences.
Celeste wore an emerald gown and enough diamonds to pay for years of cancer treatment. Lucas stood beside her in a tuxedo, smiling for photographers as if his world were perfectly intact.
I arrived in red.
The gown left the pale scar beneath my collarbone uncovered.
People noticed.
Lucas came toward me smiling.
“You look incredible.”
“So do you.”
Celeste joined us.
Her gaze dropped to my scar.
“I’m surprised you came.”
“Lucas invited me.”
She smiled coldly.
“Be careful climbing too high, Iris. Women like you can have terrible falls.”
Then she added, “Your mother certainly did.”
Lucas went white.
“Celeste.”
I looked at her.
“The ground doesn’t care what your last name is.”
Before she could answer, the ballroom lights dimmed.
The master of ceremonies announced a special presentation.
Lucas lifted his champagne.
The enormous screen behind the stage came alive.
But there were no baby photographs.
Hospital security footage appeared.
Celeste’s voice filled the ballroom.
Are the outside doctors gone?
Hannah answered.
Yes. They’re leaving now.
Then came the restored emergency audio from my mother’s room.
People shouting.
Equipment breaking.
My mother crying.
The caregiver begging security for help.
Four hundred guests stopped moving.
Celeste screamed for someone to turn it off.
The screen changed.
Bank records appeared.
LNC Maritime Holdings.
Forty-two million dollars.
Federal subsidies.
Offshore accounts.
Payments to Hannah.
Transfers into the Ashberry family trust.
Lucas dropped his champagne glass.
It shattered at his feet.
He looked at me.
“You didn’t reclassify the files.”
“Oh, I reclassified them.”
His face changed.
“I sent them to a federal grand jury.”
The ballroom doors opened.
Federal agents entered with Arthur Vance.
Lucas Wind was arrested for wire fraud, embezzlement, conspiracy, and securities violations.
Celeste was arrested on financial charges and reckless endangerment connected to my mother’s death.
Her perfect composure vanished.
She screamed about her family.
Her father.
Her lawyers.
Lucas barely looked at her.
He stared at me as agents pulled his hands behind his back.
“Iris!”
I stepped closer.
“We had ten years,” he said. “You loved me.”
I looked at the man in front of me and remembered a twenty-two-year-old boy splitting a twelve-dollar pizza with me because neither of us could afford anything else.
“I loved that boy.”
Lucas began crying.
“You killed him six years ago.”
I turned away.
The arrests were on every news station before midnight.
