Chapter 7 - The Beggar at the Gate
Two days before the New Year, winter settled over Frederick with heavy gray clouds and bitter freezing winds. I had spent the morning working in my small home office, organizing the files Arthur Vance needed for the upcoming civil lawsuit.
At eleven, the front chime rang.
I walked to the foyer, checked the monitor connected to the front porch camera, and felt my jaw tighten.
It wasn't Michael. It was Claire.
She stood on the flagstone porch wrapped in a thick wool coat, her hair pulled back into a messy bun, shivering in the biting wind. The arrogance that had painted her face at Christmas dinner had vanished, replaced by a hollow, frantic expression.
I opened the heavy oak door, keeping the brass security chain firmly latched.
"Eleanor," Claire said, her voice trembling, whether from the freezing cold or sheer panic, I couldn't tell. "Please. Unlatch the door. We need to talk."
"There is nothing to discuss, Claire. How did you find this address?"
"I... I went through Michael’s old work laptop. He had an old insurance slip with this street name on it," she stammered, wrapping her arms around her waist. "Eleanor, you have to turn the bank cards back on. Just for forty-eight hours. The bank is repossessing my Audi tomorrow morning! They’re coming to the driveway with a flatbed tow truck!"
"Then you should remove your personal belongings from the glove compartment tonight," I said evenly.
"How can you be so cruel?" tears welled in her eyes, spilling over her mascara. "What about your grandsons? Toby and Leo have school next week! How am I supposed to drive them to school without a car? Are you going to punish innocent children for an argument between adults?"
I looked at the woman who had smirked as her husband ordered me out into the cold on Christmas Day.
"You didn't think about Toby and Leo when you spent six months forging a doctor’s note to take my home," I told her, my voice dropping to a low, lethal calm. "You didn't think about them when you stood at my table and laughed while Michael threatened to throw my clothes into the street. You were happy to make me homeless. Now you’re upset because you might have to ride the county bus."
"It was Michael’s idea!" she shrieked, dropping all pretense of humility. "He said the developer would give us cash! He said you’d just move into an assisted living home and you wouldn't even notice! I was just trying to protect our family’s lifestyle!"
"Your lifestyle was an illusion bought with my late husband’s labor," I replied. "You have two able hands, Claire. Get a full-time job. Sell your designer jewelry. Pawn the coats you bought with my money."
"If you don't help us," Claire snarled, her face turning ugly, the venom breaking through the cracks in her mask, "you will never lay eyes on Toby and Leo again! I will take them to my mother’s in North Carolina and tell them their grandmother abandoned them!"
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"My lawyer has already filed for grandparent visitation rights under Maryland statute, Claire," I said coldly. "And given that Child Protective Services will likely take an interest in your home once Michael’s fraud indictment goes public, I wouldn't threaten me with the boys. Now get off my porch before I call the Frederick County Sheriff."
I closed the door in her face and threw the heavy deadbolt. Through the frosted side glass, I watched her stand there for a moment, open-mouthed, before she stumbled down the steps and fled to her car.
