Chapter 6
Mom came home a week later.
Home to Whitmore Hall.
The same house she had run from twenty years ago.
She was still weak.
Still using a cane.
But she was home.
The whole staff turned out to greet her.
The gardeners.
The maids.
The cooks.
James the butler actually cried.
“Welcome home, Miss Sarah,” he said.
“Thank you, James,” she said. “It’s good to be back.”
William and Margaret didn’t come to the door.
Julian did.
He leaned against the banister, watching.
“Welcome home, Aunt Sarah,” he said. “Nice to finally meet the legend.”
Mom smiled.
“Julian,” she said. “You were just a baby when I left. Look at you now.”
“Yep,” he said. “Still waiting for my inheritance. Now there are two of you to split it with. Life’s funny, isn’t it?”
“Julian,” Evelyn said sharply.
He held up his hands.
“Just saying.”
He walked away.
Mom watched him go.
“He’s angry,” she said quietly.
“He’s spoiled,” Evelyn corrected.
The first few days were wonderful.
Mom and I shared the blue suite.
We ate together.
We walked in the gardens.
We talked about everything and nothing.
For the first time in my life, I didn’t have to look over my shoulder.
I didn’t have to wonder where our next meal was coming from.
I didn’t have to sleep with one eye open.
But it didn’t last.
The lawyers came first.
Three men in dark suits with leather briefcases.
They sat in the library with Evelyn and Mom for four hours.
When they came out, Mom looked exhausted.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Nothing, baby,” she said. “Just… paperwork.”
But I heard them talking later that night.
Through the library door.
“The codicil is clear,” one lawyer said. “Harold Whitmore’s will left everything to you, Evelyn. But with a condition. That Sarah be provided for equally with William upon her return. If she is proven to be of sound mind and legitimate.”
“Which she is,” Evelyn said.
“Of course. But William is contesting it. He says Sarah’s twenty-year absence constitutes abandonment of her claim. He says Luna is illegitimate and has no rights to the estate.”
“He can’t do that,” Mom said.
“He can and he is,” the lawyer said. “He’s filed a motion. We have a hearing in six weeks. And he’s hired Richard Sterling.”
Evelyn cursed.
“Sterling? He’s the most expensive family law attorney in the state. He never loses.”
“Exactly. And he’s already started digging. Into Sarah’s life these past twenty years. Into Luna’s father. Into everything.”
“What about the Voss side?” Evelyn asked. “Luna’s claim to Voss Enterprises.”
“That’s even more complicated,” the lawyer said. “We’d have to prove a common-law marriage between Sarah and Marcus Voss. The necklace helps—it was an engagement gift, according to Harold’s notes. But we need more. Letters. Witnesses. Something. Without it, Christian Voss will crush us in court.”
“So what do we do?” Mom asked.
“We prepare,” the lawyer said. “For both fights. William inside the family. Voss outside it. And Mrs. Whitmore? You should know… Sterling doesn’t fight fair. He’ll go after the child. He’ll use everything he can find. Every scar. Every bad memory. Every moment of those two years on the street. He’ll make Luna look like a burden. A mistake. A reason Sarah shouldn’t inherit anything.”
I backed away from the door.
My stomach hurt.
A mistake.
A burden.
That’s what they thought of me.
Not just William and Margaret and Julian.
Now the lawyers.
Soon everyone would know.
I ran up to my room.
I locked the door.
I climbed under the covers and cried.
Quietly.
Like I had done a hundred times in shelters and alleyways.
Because I finally understood.
I wasn’t just Luna anymore.
I was a pawn.
In William’s game.
In Voss’s game.
In everyone’s game.
No one wanted me for me.
They wanted me for what I represented.
Money.
Power.
Billions of dollars.
That night at dinner, William announced it.
Like he was discussing the weather.
“I’ve filed suit,” he said, cutting into his steak. “To have Sarah and Luna removed from the will. It’s nothing personal. It’s business. The Whitmore name has a reputation. I won’t have it dragged through the mud by a runaway daughter and a fatherless child.”
Mom dropped her fork.
Evelyn stood up so fast her chair fell over.
“Get out,” she said. Her voice was shaking with rage. “Get out of my house.”
“This is as much my house as it is yours, Mother,” William said calmly. “I grew up here. I worked here. I earned my place. Sarah left. She made her choice. Now she has to live with it.”
“I will burn this entire estate to the ground before I let you take what belongs to her,” Evelyn said.
“Then we’ll see you in court,” William said. He stood up. “Margaret? Julian?”
They followed him out.
Julian paused at the door.
He looked at me.
“Sorry, cuz,” he said. “Nothing personal. Just business.”
Then he was gone.
Mom was crying.
Evelyn was shaking.
I sat there in the silence.
And I made a decision.
I couldn’t stay.
I was the problem.
If I left, Mom would get her inheritance.
William would stop fighting.
Christian Voss would have no reason to hurt anyone.
Everyone would be safe.
Everyone but me.
But that was okay.
I had survived two years on the streets.
I could survive more.
That night, I packed a bag.
Not much.
A few clothes Evelyn had bought me.
A sandwich from the kitchen.
And the necklace.
Always the necklace.
I slipped out of my room at midnight.
The guards were watching the gates.
The cameras were watching the doors.
But I knew how to be invisible.
Two years of practice.
I went down the back stairs.
Through the old servant’s passage James had mentioned once.
Out through the garden.
Over the west wall.
May you like
Into the darkness.
I didn’t look back.
