Chapter 4 - The Three-Year Debt
Zachary walked toward Lisa,
his hands held out in a gesture of peace.
"If this is true,
Lisa,"
he said,
his voice cracking,
"then I am as much a victim of this lie as you were.
I didn't know.
I swear to you,
I thought my father earned everything we had."
Lisa looked at him,
and for the first time,
her eyes filled with tears.
"I know you didn't know,
Zachary,"
she whispered.
"That was the hardest part of being here.
Watching you work so hard to maintain a legacy that was built on a shadow.
I wanted to tell you so many times,
but I couldn't risk the plan."
Ava let out a scream of frustration,
her face contorted into a mask of pure hatred.
"You think this changes anything?"
she shrieked.
"You’re just a girl with a piece of paper!
My lawyers will tie you up in court for the next fifty years!
You’ll be a grandmother before you ever see a penny of this house!"
Samuel Davis took a step forward,
his cane striking the floor with a sound like a gunshot.
"Your lawyers are already being served,
Ava,"
he said calmly.
"And your bank accounts have been frozen as of twenty minutes ago.
I didn't just send my granddaughter to clean your floors;
I sent my legal team to take apart your empire brick by brick."
The crowd gasped as several men in dark suits entered the ballroom,
carrying briefcases and legal notices.
They weren't there to party;
they were there to execute a hostile takeover of everything the Covingtons owned.
"I stayed for three years,
Ava,
not just for the money,"
Lisa said,
her voice regaining its strength.
"I stayed to see if you would ever change.
I gave you a thousand chances to be kind,
to be a decent person to someone you thought was beneath you.
But every single day,
you chose cruelty."
Lisa walked over to the buffet table,
where a towering cake sat untouched.
She picked up a crystal glass,
the same kind she had washed ten thousand times,
and held it up.
"You invited me here as a joke,"
she said to the room.
"You wanted to see what a cleaning lady would look like in an elegant gown.
Well,
now you know.
She looks like the person who owns the roof over your head."
Lisa let the glass fall from her hand.
It hit the marble floor and shattered into a million sparkling pieces,
a perfect reflection of the Covington family’s reputation.
"The party is over,
Ava,"
Samuel Davis said,
gesturing toward the door.
"I suggest you and your friends leave before the police arrive to escort you out."
The "mean girls"—Chloe,
Savannah,
and Harper—didn't wait to be told twice.
They scrambled for the exit,
not sparing a single glance for the woman who had once been their queen.
May you like
Ava stood alone in the center of the room,
surrounded by the wreckage of her own arrogance.
