The Beaumont Royale logo was printed across the top.
Room 1816.
Thursday.
Two nights earlier.
Booked under:
Evelyn Mercer.
Daniel whispered:
“You weren’t here Thursday.”
“No.”
“You were with me.”
“Until almost midnight.”
He turned toward my mother.
“What were you planning?”
Victoria said nothing.
I looked toward Marcus.
“Next file.”
The screen changed.
Security-camera footage appeared.
Date stamped Thursday.
11:08 p.m.
An elevator opened on the eighteenth floor.
A woman stepped out wearing a long camel coat.
Dark sunglasses.
A scarf covering most of her hair.
For three seconds, she could easily have been mistaken for me.
Then she looked toward the camera.
The ballroom erupted.
Lila.
My sister stood frozen beside her chair.
On-screen, she approached Room 1816.
A man followed her.
Tall.
Dark-haired.
Wearing a baseball cap.
Lila swiped the key.
They entered together.
Daniel stared at her.
“What the hell?”
My mother stepped forward.
“That proves nothing.”
“Then let’s keep watching.”
Twenty minutes later, Lila emerged.
Without the coat.
The man stepped out after her carrying an envelope.
Then my mother appeared from the stairwell.
Someone in the audience said aloud:
“Oh my God.”
Victoria met the man.
Handed him cash.
Then took his envelope.
My mother’s expression in the ballroom became rigid.
Daniel whispered:
“You staged an affair.”
Lila suddenly shouted:
“It’s not what you think!”
I turned toward her.
“You checked into a hotel room using my name while dressed like me.”
“We weren’t—”
“You brought a man into the room.”
“It wasn’t sexual!”
Daniel laughed bitterly.
“That’s supposed to help?”
Lila’s breathing became frantic.
“He was an actor.”
Every head turned toward her.
My mother closed her eyes.
Lila realized too late what she’d admitted.
I nodded.
“Correct.”
Another screen appeared.
A booking invoice from an entertainment agency.
Private appearance — two hours.
The payment came from a card belonging to an LLC named Bellmere Events.
The registered manager:
Victoria Mercer.
My mother looked at me.
“You don’t understand.”
“I understand perfectly.”
“No, you don’t.”
“You canceled my dress. You ordered another one. You staged photographs of Lila pretending to be me entering a hotel room with another man. You booked the room under my name. Then you planted a forged confession inside my wedding dress.”
My voice shook now.
Not with fear.
With fury.
“You were going to make Daniel believe I’d cheated on him.”
Victoria lifted her chin.
“Because he isn’t right for you.”
Daniel stared at her.
“That was your justification?”
“You don’t know our family.”
“No,” he said. “I’m beginning to.”
I took a breath.
“But this still doesn’t explain why.”
My mother’s eyes flicked toward Lila.
That glance was enough.
“Next slide.”
The screen displayed another email.
Not about dresses.
About money.
Lila to Victoria:
If they get married, he’s going to start asking questions.
Victoria:
Evelyn doesn’t understand those accounts.
Lila:
He does.
Daniel became very still.
I looked at him.
Then at the audience.
“Daniel works in corporate restructuring.”
Everyone close to us knew that.
What almost no one knew was that three months earlier I had asked Daniel to examine statements connected to a trust left to me by my late grandfather.
