Chapter 7 - When Scorpions Sting
The aftermath of the gala was an absolute bloodbath in the local press.
The morning headlines of the *Mercer County Tribune* screamed: **SCANDAL AT THE BELLEVUE: PR SOCIALITE AND DISGRACED ARCHITECT ARRESTED FOR MILLION-DOLLAR FRAUD DURING CHARITY GALA.**
Photos of Maris being led out in handcuffs, mascara running down her cheeks, were plastered across every social media feed in the state. Her PR agency lost eleven corporate clients before nine a.m. By noon, her website was taken down, and the landlord of her downtown office suite served an eviction notice for non-payment of rent.
Patrick’s mugshot was equally damning. Disheveled, stubbled, his eyes glazed with the realization that his architectural career was dead and buried.
At two o’clock that afternoon, I was sitting on my back porch, enjoying the quiet sunshine and watching the birds flit between the hydrangeas. Rosie was at Erin’s house, swimming in the pool with Erin’s daughters, completely shielded from the media circus.
The side gate creaked open.
I didn't flinch. I took a slow sip of my iced tea.
Maris walked into the yard.
She looked unrecognizable. The glamorous, untouchable socialite from the night before was completely gone. She wore an oversized gray hoodie, dirty sweatpants, and no makeup. Her eyes were swollen, red-rimmed, and dark circles bruised the skin beneath them. She had posted bail three hours ago—again, using Eleanor’s dwindling credit—and she looked like an animal that had been running through briars for days.
She stopped at the foot of the porch steps, staring up at me.
“You ruined my life,” she rasped, her voice hoarse from crying.
“You ruined your own life, Maris,” I answered, not moving an inch. “I just turned on the lights so everyone could see the mess you made.”
Maris slowly climbed the steps, her hand resting against her abdomen. “Cecily... please. Look at me. I’m carrying a child. Whatever you think I did—”
“I don’t *think* you did anything, Maris. I have the certified bank records, the wire transfers, and Chloe Simmons’s taped confession. You forged my signature to steal nearly a million dollars.”
Maris fell to her knees on the porch deck.
The dramatic gesture was so typical, so deeply ingrained in her narcissistic playbook, that it almost made me laugh.
“I was desperate, Cecy!” she wept, clasping her hands together as if praying to me. “You don't know what it was like! Tobias was so cold to me! He treated me like a trophy, not a woman! He controlled every penny! Patrick was the only person who made me feel seen, who told me I was beautiful!”
“So you decided to take my husband, my house, and my daughter’s future?” I asked, leaning forward, my voice cutting through her tears like a razor. “That was your solution to feeling unseen?”
“It was Patrick’s idea!” she pleaded, pointing wildly toward nowhere. “He came to me! He told me he could move the money from your father’s trust without anyone ever knowing! He promised me we would live in that penthouse, that we would raise this baby together! He lied to me, Cecily! You saw what he did last night! He threw me to the wolves the second the police showed up! He’s a monster!”
“I know he’s a monster,” I said calmly. “The difference between you and me, Maris, is that you chose to be his accomplice.”
Maris crawled closer, reaching out to touch the hem of my jeans. “Cecy, please. Drop the criminal charges. If you go to the district attorney and say this was a family misunderstanding, they’ll reduce it to a civil matter. I can’t go to prison! I can’t have this baby in a correctional facility! Think about our family! Think about Mom!”
I looked down at her hand on my pant leg.
“Do you remember when we were twelve, Maris?” I asked softly.
She blinked, confused by the sudden shift. “What?”
“Dad bought me that vintage bicycle for my birthday,” I said, remembering the metallic red paint, the white wicker basket. “I spent months polishing it. One afternoon, you took it without asking, rode it down the quarry hill, crashed it into a boulder, and left it broken in the mud. When Dad asked what happened, you told him I had dared you to do it, and that I was the one who pushed you down the hill.”
Tears streamed down Maris’s cheeks, but she stayed silent.
“Dad grounded me for a month,” I continued. “He took away my allowance. And Mom bought you a brand-new bike the next week to ‘comfort’ you from the trauma of falling. You spent your whole life breaking my things and letting me take the blame.”
I stood up, stepping backward out of her reach.
“That era of my life is over, Maris. You crashed the bike. Now you get to pay for the repairs.”
Maris’s face instantly hardened. The pathetic, weeping victim vanished in the span of a single heartbeat, replaced by the vicious, venomous creature she had always been beneath the makeup.
She scrambled to her feet, wiping her nose with the sleeve of her hoodie, her eyes blazing with pure malice.
“You think you’ve won, don't you?” she hissed, stepping closer, her voice dropping into a hateful whisper. “You think you’re so smart with your little spreadsheets and your moral superiority! But Patrick never loved you, Cecily! Not for one single second!”
I didn't blink. “Is that right?”
“He used to laugh at you in bed!” she spat, venom dripping from every syllable. “He used to tell me how boring you were! How touching you felt like a chore! He said being with you was like being married to an accountant’s balance sheet! He came to my bed every Thursday because I gave him things you were too frigid to even imagine!”
The words were designed to gut me. They were designed to tear down my pride, to make me weep, to make me scream.
Instead, I looked at her, and all I felt was overwhelming pity.
“If he loved you so much, Maris,” I said, my voice deadpan and steady, “why is he sitting in a holding cell right now signing an affidavit that names you as the mastermind of the entire fraud scheme in exchange for a plea deal?”
Maris went completely, utterly rigid.
Her jaw slacked. “What?”
“Tobias’s attorney just texted me twenty minutes ago,” I said, tapping my phone screen. “Patrick took a proffer interview with the prosecutor at noon. He turned over your private text messages, your voice memos, and the bank routing numbers for the Swiss clinic. He traded you for a reduced sentence at a minimum-security facility.”
Maris’s face drained of every drop of blood. She looked like she had just been hit by a freight train.
“He... he wouldn't...” she stammered, stumbling backward down the porch steps. “He loved me...”
“Patrick doesn't love anyone, Maris,” I said, standing tall at the top of the stairs. “Not me. Not you. Not even that child in your womb. Patrick only loves Patrick. And now, you two get to tear each other apart in criminal court while I sit back and watch.”
I pointed toward the open side gate.
“Get off my property. Before I call the sheriff and have your bail revoked for witness intimidation.”
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Maris didn't scream. She didn't cry. She turned around, stumbling like a ghost through the gate, and disappeared down the street, completely and utterly shattered.
***