Chapter 1 - The Fall
“THAT CHILD’S BLOOD WILL NEVER BELONG IN THIS FAMILY!”
Diane Bennett’s voice cracked across the second-floor balcony like a gunshot.
Emma tightened both arms around ten-month-old Lily. “Diane, lower your voice. You’re scaring her.”
“I’m done being polite to you.” Diane came closer, diamonds flashing at her throat. “You walked into this family with nothing, married my son, and now you expect me to hand over everything my husband built.”
“I don’t want your money.”
“Then what’s in the envelope?”
Emma’s hand moved instinctively toward the cream clutch resting on the balcony table.
That was all Diane needed to see.
She grabbed Emma’s arm.
“Let go of me.”
“Give me the papers.”
“Diane, stop.”
Lily began to cry.
Emma tried to step back, but Diane’s fingers dug harder into her skin. Then, with a sudden violent twist, Diane ripped Lily from Emma’s arms.
“GIVE HER BACK!”
Diane backed toward the glass railing.
Emma saw the drop behind her. Two stories. Black-and-white marble below. A chandelier hanging over the open atrium.
“Diane.” Emma’s voice broke. “Please.”
For one second, Diane looked down at Lily.
Then she opened her hands.
Emma screamed.
Lily fell.
Michael came through the foyer at the exact wrong moment—or the only right one.
He saw a white blanket dropping through the atrium and ran without understanding what he was running toward.
He threw himself beneath it.
The impact drove him to both knees.
For one horrible second, the house went silent.
Then Lily cried.
Michael crushed his daughter against his chest, shaking. “Daddy’s got you. I’ve got you.”
Emma flew down the stairs, barely touching the steps. She collapsed beside them, hands moving frantically over Lily’s head, shoulders, tiny legs.
“She’s breathing.”
Michael looked up.
Diane stood at the railing.
Security guards rushed into the foyer.
“What happened?” one shouted.
Emma pointed upward. “She dropped my baby.”
Diane’s face hardened. “That child is not a Bennett.”
Michael went still.
“What did you say?”
Emma remembered the envelope.
She pulled it from her clutch with trembling fingers.
Diane saw it and lost color.
“Emma,” she said. “Don’t open that.”
Michael looked between them. “What is it?”
Emma held the envelope against her chest.
“The reason your mother wanted Lily gone before tomorrow.”
Diane lunged toward the stairs.
The guards grabbed her.
Michael stared at his mother.
“Before tomorrow?”
Emma opened the envelope.
The first page was a DNA report.
The second was a trust amendment signed by Michael’s dead father.
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And the third page contained one sentence that made Michael forget how to breathe.
UPON THE BIRTH OF MICHAEL BENNETT’S FIRST BIOLOGICAL CHILD, INTERIM CONTROL OF BENNETT GROUP SHALL TERMINATE IMMEDIATELY.
