The Price of Stealing from the Quiet Daughter of a Powerful Empire
His shoulders were hunched, and his feet dragged against the carpet.
I sat there for a moment, my hands flat on the table.
“He admitted it,” my father said from the window.
“On video.”
“Yes,” I said.
But I didn’t feel the rush of victory I thought I would.
I just felt tired.
The kind of tired that comes after a long day of stripping lead paint off an old cabinet.
“We have enough for the custody hearing,” Sarah said, closing her laptop.
“He’ll never get near Maisie again.”
I stood up and walked out of the conference room.
I wanted to get out of the building.
I wanted to feel the cold air on my face.
As I waited for the elevator, my phone buzzed in my pocket.
I pulled it out, expecting another message from the nanny.
Instead, it was an email from an address I didn’t recognize.
The subject line was simply: *Sloane.*
I opened it.
There was no text in the body of the email.
Only a single attachment.
A PDF titled *The Delaware Trust_Sloane_Barrett_Nolan_Pierce_Agreement.*
I clicked on the attachment.