Chapter 2

The slap left a high, thin ringing in my ears.

Before I could speak, the other parents closed around us.

“Look at her. Dressed like she belongs on a charity board.”

“All that money on clothes, and she still has to sleep with someone else's husband.”

One woman leaned close enough for me to smell the coffee on her breath.

“Couldn't find a man of your own? Or did you think having his baby would make him leave his wife?”

Behind the car window, Effie was crying.

I looked past the woman and caught my driver's eye. He already had his phone to his ear.

I pointed toward the quieter side entrance.

He nodded.

“Women like you make me sick,” another mother said. “And now your daughter's going to grow up exactly like you.”

“That kid got what was coming to her.”

People slowed on the sidewalk. A delivery rider stopped beside his bicycle. Someone asked what had happened, and three women answered at once.

“Caught her sleeping with this poor woman's husband.”

“Had a baby with him, too.”

Phones came up.

Nobody asked why there was a frightened child in the back of the car. Nobody asked to see proof.

A man near the curb spat at my feet. A woman spat on my sleeve.

I looked down at the stain.

The coat was couture, custom-made and set with antique stones along the collar. The insurance valuation alone was over a million.

I slipped it off, folded the stained fabric inward, and dropped it into the trash can beside the gate.

Jolene watched, her eyes briefly following the stones.

Then I faced her.

“You instructed your son to hurt my daughter. You've admitted it in writing. Now you've hit me in front of witnesses.”

I kept my voice level.

“What makes you think you can do any of this without consequences?”

She gave a sharp laugh.

“A wife slapping her husband's mistress? That's a consequence.”

A few people laughed with her.

“My husband runs Goldcrest,” she continued. “Do you have any idea who he does business with?”

I did.

I had introduced him to every one of them.

“People disappear for crossing families like that,” she said. “Do you honestly think anyone would care what happened to you and your little mistake?”

She delivered the threat loudly enough for the phones to record it.

Apparently, she thought that made it more impressive.

“If you hadn't slept with her husband, none of this would be happening,” a parent said.

“You should be apologizing.”

“On your knees, preferably.”

Another woman looked directly into someone's camera.

“Make sure you get her face. Other wives deserve to know who she is.”

I heard the far-side car door open.

Through a gap in the crowd, I saw my driver lift Effie out with her face tucked against his shoulder. He carried her toward the side entrance, keeping the car between her and the mob.

She was out.

Only then did I let myself take a full breath.

Jolene followed my glance, but her attention caught on the Rolls-Royce.

For a second, she simply stared.

Then she rounded on me.

“He bought you this?”

I said nothing.

“A Rolls-Royce?”

She looked from the car to my clothes, reassessing everything she thought she'd understood.

“You've been spending my husband's money like this?”

She pulled a key from her handbag.

I watched her step toward the car.

“Be very sure about what you're doing, Jolene.”

She drove the point into the paint.

Metal scraped beneath her hand. She dragged the key hard along the door, then went back to carve the first letter.

“You don't get to threaten me.”

People gathered behind her, watching the words take shape.

HOMEWRECKERS DESERVE TO DIE.

She stepped back, breathing hard.

“There. Now everyone knows what you are.”

I looked at the inscription.

“Very soon, you're going to wish you hadn't written that.”

Her expression twisted.

“You spend his money, drive his car, and still act like you're better than me?”

She snatched a loose brick from the edge of a planter.

“Let's see how superior you feel when you have to pay it all back.”

The first blow struck a headlight.

Plastic and glass scattered across the pavement.

Someone gasped. Then a parent shouted, “Good for you!”

Jolene swung again.

This time, the brick hit the hood.

The sound seemed to release something in the others. A woman grabbed a broken paving stone. Another took a metal rod from the landscaping beside the entrance.

They descended on the car.

I stepped back as a stone struck a side window. Cracks spread across the glass. A second blow broke through.

The alarm began shrieking.

No one stopped.

A mother whose daughter had shared cupcakes with Effie at her birthday party reached through the broken window and unlocked a door.

“Look at these seats.”

She dragged something sharp across the leather.

Another woman climbed halfway inside and tore at the console. Someone kicked the damaged headlight until it came loose.

They were laughing now.

I stood beyond the flying glass and watched them destroy the car that had brought my injured child to school.

At the side entrance, my driver had Effie safely behind a locked glass door. He looked at me, waiting.

I held up my hand.

Stay with her.

His duty was to my daughter. He understood.

Within minutes, the windows were broken, the bodywork dented, and strips of leather hung out of the open doors.

Then the trunk sprang open.

“Jolene! Come look at this.”

Inside were the auction purchases my driver had collected that morning. We hadn't returned to the estate to unload them before I'd discovered Effie's injuries.

A woman pulled aside a protective cover.

“Oh, she's been shopping.”

Jolene approached, brick still in hand.

She set it down and lifted a long archival case from the trunk. Inside was an Old Master drawing, mounted and protected for transport.

My father's birthday gift.

She stripped away the wrapping.

“You collect art now?”

I took a step toward her.

“Put that down.”

Her eyes brightened.

Finally, she'd found something I cared about enough to react.

“What's wrong? Afraid I'll ruin your little performance?”

She held the drawing up for the crowd.

“This is what she does with money stolen from someone else's family. Buys herself a little culture.”

“Jolene.”

“Something this beautiful doesn't belong with someone like you.”

She pulled the sheet free of its mounting.

Then she tore it.

The sound was small. Almost lost beneath the car alarm.

I stopped moving.

She ripped it again and dropped the pieces at my feet.

“There. Much more your style.”

Her heel came down on the paper. She ground it against the pavement, smearing dirt across the ink.

A gray-haired man pushed closer.

“Wait.”

He crouched without touching the fragments.

“Was that from the Bellori sale?”

Jolene glanced at him.

“The drawing that opened at thirty million?” His face had gone pale. “Jesus Christ. I think it was.”

For the first time, several parents fell silent.

Jolene shrugged.

“So?”

The man looked up at her.

“You just destroyed it.”

“With my husband's money,” she said. “Which makes it mine.”

She turned to the others.

“I'm allowed to do what I like with my own property.”

I could barely trust myself to speak.

Zachary had entered our marriage with debts he couldn't pay. I'd cleared them. I'd given him an office, a salary, and authority over a business he hadn't built.

Under his management, Goldcrest had lost nearly half its value.

My accountants had urged me to remove him. I'd kept giving him time.

Now his mistress was standing over thirty million dollars' worth of ruined paper, telling strangers she'd paid for it.

Behind her, the others returned to the trunk.

The hesitation had passed.

One woman smashed a porcelain vase against the curb. Another tore open a second case. Bronze struck pavement with a heavy crack.

They egged each other on, each eager to prove she was more loyal to Jolene than the last.

I took out my phone and called the consigliere.

“Where are you?”

He answered, but I spoke over him.

“You have five minutes. I want you at the front gate.”

A hand lunged into my field of vision.

One of the mothers ripped the phone from my grip.

“Who are you calling?”

She threw it onto the pavement and brought her heel down on the screen.

“Your boyfriend?”

The glass splintered.

“Maybe she's got another one,” someone said. “A backup for when married men get tired of her.”

Laughter broke out.

The woman kicked the phone toward the gutter.

“You can stop pretending you're important. Nobody's coming to save you.”

I looked at the broken screen, then at her face.

“I hope you remember exactly what you did here.”

She rolled her eyes.

I turned away from her and found Vera standing near the gate.

She'd watched the whole thing.

The threats. The broken windows. The destruction.

Not once had she asked anyone to stop.

“Did you know what was happening to Effie?”

Vera folded her arms.

I moved closer.

“When Murray hurt her. When she cried. Did you know?”

“Oh, stop making a scene.”

“Answer me.”

She glanced at Jolene, who was brushing dust from her hands.

Then she looked back at me.

“Yes. I knew.”

The words were almost a relief. No ambiguity left. No excuse I would have to listen to later.

“And you let it happen?”

“Children need to learn that actions have consequences.”

“My daughter is five.”

“Then perhaps you should have thought about her before getting involved with a married man.”

Her lip curled.

“An illegitimate child from a woman like you? This school has a reputation to protect.”

I held her gaze.

Vera didn't hesitate.

“Murray was taking out the trash. I don't see the problem.”