Part 2: They made me kneel in my own living room while my mother-in-law cut my wedding dress into strips with kitchen scissors.

Before Marcus was brought up, I received a live video feed on my monitor from the Lake Forest estate.

It was 9:00 AM.

On the screen, four large moving vans from a sheriff’s liquidation contractor were parked along the circular cobblestone driveway of the Harrison ancestral home.

Victoria Harrison stood on the manicured front lawn in a bathrobe, screaming at three uniformed deputies who were methodically carrying out antique oil paintings, silver candelabras, and Louis XIV armchairs.

"This furniture has been in my family for four generations!" Victoria wailed, her voice captured clearly through the telephoto microphone of our surveillance team. "You cannot touch that desk! It belonged to a governor!"

"Ma'am, step away from the truck," a deputy said without looking up from his clipboard. "The writ of execution covers all personal property on the premises to satisfy the default judgment held by Vance Global. You have fifteen minutes to gather your personal clothing and vacate the residence."

"I am not leaving my house!"

"It isn't your house, Mrs. Harrison," the deputy replied dryly. "The deed was signed over to the holding company at midnight. If you are still on the property in fourteen minutes, you will be arrested for criminal trespassing."

On the monitor, I watched Victoria collapse onto the damp grass, her bare feet covered in mud, clutching a framed portrait of herself that one of the movers had discarded on the lawn.

Nobody stopped to help her. Her neighbors, people she had sneered at and snubbed at country club luncheons for three decades, stood at the edge of their driveways, filming the eviction on their iPhones.

I tapped the screen, turning off the feed.

Justice was not always poetic. Sometimes it was just cold, administrative, and mathematically precise.

The double oak doors of my office swung open.

Marcus walked in.

He looked like he had aged twenty years in three days. His bespoke suit was rumpled, stained with coffee down the lapel. His tie was missing, his top collar unbuttoned, exposing pale, hollow collarbones. He walked with a slight limp, his eyes wild and bloodshot.

He stopped in the center of the vast, minimalist office, staring at me as I sat behind a desk larger than his entire former cubicle.

"Clara," he breathed, his voice cracking with dry despair. "Please."

"Sit down, Marcus," I said, gesturing to the single low leather chair opposite my desk. "You look unstable."

Marcus stumbled toward the chair and collapsed into it, burying his face in his hands. His shoulders shook violently as he began to weep—ugly, gasping sobs that echoed off the plate-glass windows.

"I didn't know," Marcus wept, looking up through red, swollen eyes. "Clara, I swear on my life, I didn't know who you were! I didn't know my mother was going to cut your dress! I didn't know Ashley was lying to me!"

"You didn't know Ashley was lying?" I asked, tilting my head. "Or did you simply not care, because you thought she was richer than me?"

Marcus choked on his own breath, unable to answer.

"You knew your mother was cutting my dress, Marcus," I said, my voice dropping to a terrifyingly level tone. "You stood by the fireplace. You held a glass of scotch. You watched Richard hold my arms behind my back. You watched her pour wine over my hair. And do you know what you said when she called me trash?"

Marcus closed his eyes tightly, tears streaming down his stubbled cheeks. "Don't... please..."