Chapter 7 - THE RECKONING AT THE OFFICE
Mom and Lauren spun around toward the front door. Grandpa stepped past the deputies, walking slowly up the front steps with his hands resting calmly on the handle of his walking cane. He didn't look angry; he looked like a judge arriving to pass down an unappealable sentence.
"Dad," Mom stammered, her voice pitching up into a hysterical, defensive shriek. "Thank goodness! You need to talk to this madman! He’s standing here accusing us of stealing from Madison, when we’ve spent the last two years housing her and her bastard child out of the goodness of our hearts!"
Grandpa stopped two feet from the threshold. His eyes swept over Lauren’s designer clothes, over the expensive espresso machine visible on the kitchen counter, and finally landed on Mom’s panicked face.
"You housed her," Grandpa repeated softly. "In a drafty guest room, while you stripped her bank accounts, stole her vehicle, and forced an eighteen-year-old girl with a newborn to push a bicycle with a flat tire through a freezing rainstorm."
Lauren stepped forward, trying to salvage her usual manipulative charm. "Grandpa, Madison is lying! She’s always been unstable, she makes things up for attention—"
"Quiet, Lauren," Grandpa cut her off with a single word, but the force behind it made Lauren step back as if she had been physically struck. "I spent the entire night reviewing your mother's digital footprint. I saw the receipts for your Cabo trip paid with Madison’s trust card. I saw the text messages where you mocked her for crying over her missing college fund."
He turned his gaze back to Mom.
"You thought because I was getting older, I wouldn't notice what was happening right under my roof," Grandpa continued, his voice rising just enough to carry across the quiet neighborhood. "You thought you could bleed my granddaughter dry and throw her out like trash. Well, Sarah, the bill has come due."
Marcus Vance stepped forward, handing Mom a clipboard. "You have exactly two hours to pack your personal belongings and vacate the premises. All remaining luxury vehicles, electronics, and jewelry purchased with diverted trust funds are now property of the estate."
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"You can't do this!" Mom shrieked, tears of pure rage springing to her eyes. "We have rights! We’ll fight you in court!"
"Fight with what money?" Grandpa asked coldly. "Your husband’s corporate accounts were frozen twenty minutes ago, and your personal credit cards have just been declined. You are officially penniless, Sarah. Exactly where you started before you married into my family."
