She thought her husband’s mother was only trying to control her—until the day she woke up unable to move and discovered the woman had been planning it all along.

It was eight o'clock at night when Ethan returned to the Marlowe estate. The massive limestone mansion sat on thirty acres of manicured land, its dark windows reflecting the cold moonlight.

The front doors were unlocked.

Ethan pushed them open and stepped into the grand marble foyer. The house was eerie, dead quiet. The usual domestic staff had been dismissed early for the evening—a clear sign that Margaret had realized the net was closing in around her.

Ethan marched up the grand staircase and headed directly toward Margaret’s private wing of the mansion.

He didn't knock. He kicked open the double mahogany doors of her private study.

Margaret was sitting behind her glass desk, a crystal snifter of cognac in her hand. She had changed into a dark velvet evening dress, her graying hair pinned up impeccably, though the pale, hollow look in her eyes betrayed her absolute terror.

"Ethan," Margaret said, her voice dripping with artificial composure. "I assumed you would come back. We need to talk like rational adults. I have already called our corporate attorneys. If we manage this quietly, we can put Ava in a comfortable sanitarium in Switzerland, and—"

Ethan walked across the room, grabbed the crystal cognac glass out of her hand, and threw it against the marble fireplace, where it shattered into a hundred sparkling shards.

Margaret jumped, a small shriek escaping her lips.

"Where are the rest of the pills, Margaret?" Ethan demanded, leaning over the desk, his face inches from hers. "Where are the forged documents?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Margaret hissed, her eyes narrowing into cold slits. "You're acting out of emotional weakness, Ethan! That girl was nothing before you met her! Her father was a failed logistics manager! I brought her into this family out of charity, and she turned you against your own mother!"

"You poisoned her!" Ethan screamed, his voice shaking the walls of the study. "You gave her paralytics for months! She trusted you! I trusted you!"

"I protected this family!" Margaret yelled back, standing up and slamming her hands onto the desk. "She was taking your focus away from the company! You were talking about selling shares, moving to the coast, leaving the Marlowe legacy behind just so she could paint her stupid pictures! I built this empire with your father! I was not going to let a fragile little nobody tear it down!"

Ethan looked at her with pure disgust. "You’re a monster."

"I am a mother!" Margaret cried out, her chest heaving. "A mother who knows what is best for her son!"

"You're going to prison," Ethan said flatly.

He turned his back on her and walked over to the heavy brass painting hanging on the west wall—a portrait of his late father. Ethan grabbed the side of the frame and swung it open, revealing the heavy wall safe hidden behind it.

"Ethan, stop!" Margaret panicked, rushing around the desk. "You don't have the combination! That is private company business!"

Ethan didn't need the combination. He reached into his coat pocket, pulled out the emergency biometric override key he had taken from his father's safe-deposit box after his death, and inserted it into the digital lock.

The electronic keypad chimed twice, and the heavy steel door clicked open.

Inside were rows of thick, black leather-bound ledgers, stacks of off-shore bank certificates, and a silver thumb drive labeled with a single handwritten word: AVA.

Ethan snatched the thumb drive and the top leather ledger.

"Give those back to me!" Margaret shrieked, clawing at his sleeve with her manicured nails. "Ethan, give them back! You don't know what you're doing!"

Ethan shoved her back effortlessly. She stumbled over her high heels and crashed onto the leather sofa, her face pale with absolute horror.