Chapter 5 - Chloe's Golden Mirage
Chloe backed away from her mother as if Eleanor had suddenly sprouted scales. "You lied to me," Chloe whispered, her voice trembling with an adolescent rage that had never known real consequence. "You told me Clara was crazy. You told me Grandpa was a monster who stole our inheritance! You said we were coming here to take what was ours!"
"Chloe, darling, be quiet—" Eleanor gasped, still clinging to my leg until Sheriff Miller stepped forward, placing a heavy, gloved hand on her shoulder and forcing her back onto her heels.
"Don't touch her, Eleanor," Miller warned softly. "Step back."
"I gave up my internship in Miami for this!" Chloe screamed, tears carving black channels through her makeup. "I told all my friends we were moving into a four-hundred-acre estate! My boyfriend is flying up next week! Where am I supposed to go?"
"You could try getting a job," I told her quietly.
Chloe looked at me with pure disgust. "A job? Doing what? Working at a barn like you? Look at your hands, Clara! They’re calloused and gross! Look at your clothes! You lived like a peasant while Grandpa sat on millions!"
"These calloused hands kept him alive," I said, stepping closer to her until she flinched and looked away. "These hands turned the compost, hauled the feed, and held his hand when the pain was so bad he couldn't speak. Grandpa didn't hoard his money, Chloe. He spent it on the community. He endowed fifty scholarships at the local vocational school. He preserved three hundred acres of old-growth cedar so loggers wouldn't strip the mountain bare. He lived simply because he knew that things don't make a man."
"Well, things make me!" Chloe cried out, entirely shameless.
From the hallway, the heavy footsteps of the movers returned. The lead mover, a burly man with tattoos down both forearms, stopped at the doorway, looking awkwardly between the crying girl, the woman on the floor, and the armed sheriff.
"Uh... Mr. Vane?" the mover asked, scratching his beard. "The second truck just pulled up. That's two thousand dollars for the transit from the airport depot, plus the eight hundred deposit balance for the offloading crew. We need the credit card before we bring the rest of the boxes in."
Richard looked like a drowning man. His hands fluttered over his pockets, pulling out a battered leather wallet. He extracted a gold credit card with a peeling magnetic strip and handed it over with a trembling hand.
"Take it," Richard muttered. "Just... put it on this."
The mover pulled a mobile card reader from his back pocket, swiped the card, and waited. A shrill, electronic beep pierced the tension in the room.
"Declined, chief," the mover said flatly.
"Try it again!" Richard insisted, his voice rising in panic. "It’s a corporate account! There’s plenty of room!"
The mover swiped it a second time. Another shrill beep.
"Declined again. Code 04. Card restricted by issuer." The mover looked around the room, taking in Sheriff Miller's uniform and Vance’s stern gaze. His expression hardened. "Listen, pal, I don't know what kind of family drama you got going on here, but my boys don't work for free. If you can't pay the transit fee, everything we unloaded goes right back on the trailer, and your stuff goes to a bonded storage locker in Portland with a daily lien until the bill is settled in cash."
"No!" Eleanor screamed from the floor. "My wardrobe! My furs from the Naples house are in those crates!"
"Then you better find two thousand eight hundred bucks in cash, lady," the mover said, turning on his heel. "Boys! Pack it back up! Job's canceled!"
"Wait! Wait!" Richard scrambled after the mover into the foyer, his dignity completely shattered as he pleaded for an extension, offering his wristwatch, his shoes, anything to stop the truck from leaving.
Vance watched them go without a shred of emotion. He turned back to the desk and picked up a heavy silver key, distinct from the small brass one I held.
"Now that the domestic melodrama has reached its intermission," Vance said, "there is another matter Thomas wished to address. Clara, take this."
He held out the silver key to me.
"What is it, Mr. Vance?" I asked, looking at the intricate engravings on the bow.
May you like
"That," Vance said, glancing darkly at Eleanor, "unlocks the fireproof floor safe in the basement archives. The one Thomas installed in 2010. The one Eleanor spent three years searching for before she abandoned you."
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