Chapter 4 - The Woman Behind the Pale Rose
At eleven o'clock, there was a quiet knock at my hotel suite door. I had agreed to this meeting on one condition: Eleanor remained in the room, and the conversation was recorded.
The woman who walked in looked remarkably different from the glamorous socialite captured in the grainy surveillance photos. Victoria Sterling was twenty-six, slender, and dressed in an oversized beige trench coat that looked as though it were holding her up by sheer force of will. Her eyes were swollen, and the pristine makeup from the night before was nowhere to be seen.
She stood near the entry console, clutching her handbag like a shield.
""Sit down, Victoria,"" I said from the sofa, gesturing to the chair opposite me.
She hesitated, then perched on the edge of the seat, her hands shaking so badly she had to fold them in her lap. ""Jacqueline... I didn't know about the baby. I swear to God, I didn't know.""
I raised an eyebrow. ""Ambrose has been featured in four profile magazines this summer celebrating the upcoming arrival of his heir. You attended the summer benefit at the Hamptons where I was clearly six months pregnant. Do not insult me by pretending you were blind.""
Victoria flinched. Color rose in her pale cheeks, burning through her shame. ""He told me it was a marriage of convenience,"" she stammered, tears spilling over her lower lashes. ""He told me you had an arrangement. That you wanted the Blackwell name and the financial security, but that you lived separate lives behind closed doors. He swore you were planning to announce an amicable separation right after the birth.""
""And you believed him?"" I asked, my voice calm, almost clinical. ""Or did you just want to believe that you were special enough to tame the untouchable Ambrose Blackwell?""
She lowered her head, weeping silently. ""My father's company was falling apart. Ambrose promised that if I stayed with him, he would ensure the Singapore funding went through. He said he would take care of me. And now... now my father just called me screaming. He said our credit lines were pulled this morning. Ambrose isn't answering his phone. His assistant told me I was banned from the Blackwell building.""
""Of course you are,"" I said, leaning forward. ""Ambrose doesn't protect people, Victoria. Ambrose consumes them. When he is finished with them, he leaves them behind just like he left me last night. You were a business transaction wrapped in perfume.""
""What am I supposed to do?"" she cried, looking up at me with sheer desperation. ""Everything is ruined.""
""You are going to take the statement Eleanor drafted,"" I said, sliding a document across the table. ""You will sign the affidavit confirming the dates, the locations, and the fact that Ambrose used corporate funds to finance your penthouse at the Beaumont. You will do this because it is the only way Eleanor doesn't name you as an unindicted co-conspirator in the corporate embezzlement suit we are filing at noon.""
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Victoria looked at the paper, then looked at me. There was no hatred in my eyes—only the cold, immovable reality of survival.
She picked up the pen.
