Estela's lips curled into a sneer. She leaned back in her chair, her bony fingers lacing together on top of the table. "Frances, making accusations requires evidence. Jagger's materials were strictly vetted by the foundation. How could there be fraud?"

Frances didn't flinch. She gestured to Phoebe. Phoebe walked to the front of the room and connected a tablet to the projector. A moment later, a document appeared on the large screen at the end of the room.

It was a private investigator's report.

The first page showed Jagger's official biography. Born to a poor family. Raised in a disadvantaged neighborhood. A bright student who worked part-time jobs and relied on community scholarships to survive. The classic American dream story.

Frances clicked the remote in her hand. The image changed.

A photograph filled the screen. Jagger, wearing the crisp, navy blazer of Trinity Academy-an elite private school-standing beside a horse at a prestigious equestrian club. He was surrounded by other teenagers, all of them dripping with the kind of old money that didn't need scholarships.

The color drained from Jagger's face. He looked down at his hands, his fingers twisting in his lap.

Estela's eyes narrowed, but she recovered quickly. "A photograph proves nothing. Perhaps he attended a summer camp."

Frances clicked again. A new document appeared. Financial records from Trinity Academy for the past five years. A single, six-figure anonymous donation, specifically earmarked to cover Jagger's full tuition and boarding expenses.

The payment didn't come from a charity. It came from a shell company registered in the Cayman Islands.

Frances let the information sink in before she spoke. "My investigator traced the shell company. It has hidden financial ties to an overseas subsidiary of the Burnett Group."

The murmurs started again, louder this time. The trustees weren't just surprised; they were alarmed. This wasn't just polishing a resume. This was a systematic, organized deception. And the money was coming from their own backyard.

On the screen, Baron's face was like thunder. "This is slander! Frances, you're investigating a child!"

"I am conducting due diligence on a candidate who stands to inherit billions," Frances shot back, her voice ice. "You of all people should understand that, Baron."

Jagger suddenly began to cry. It was a soft, choking sound that drew every eye in the room. He turned to Estela, his body trembling.

"Great-grandmother," he sobbed, his voice cracking. "I... I just didn't want you to think I wasn't good enough for the Burnetts. That's why I hid the sponsorship... I was ashamed..."

He looked utterly pitiful. A poor boy, overwhelmed by the wealth around him, making a foolish mistake out of pride. It was a masterful performance.

Estela immediately wrapped an arm around his shoulders, pulling him close. "Good boy," she said, her voice softening. "I understand your hardship."

She looked up at the board members, her expression hardening. "The matter is clear! The child made a mistake out of pride. But his excellence is undeniable!"

She was trying to rewrite the narrative. She was trying to turn 'fraud' into 'omission'.

Frances didn't let her. "Then who sponsored him anonymously?" Frances asked, her voice cutting through the sentiment. "Is the source of this money legal? Why was it routed through an offshore company? These questions are not answered in the foundation's due diligence report."

The questions hung in the air, unanswered and damning. Estela had no response. The room fell into a tense standoff. Jagger's credibility was in ruins.

Estela realized that pushing the adoption through today was impossible. The board was spooked. The questions were too dangerous. She had to retreat, but she would not surrender.

She looked at Frances, her eyes flashing with a cold, calculating light. "Since there are concerns about both candidates," Estela announced, her voice ringing with false fairness, "I propose that both Jagger and Arvel Galvan be placed under the Burnett family's guardianship observation period."

She held up a hand to silence the expected objections. "For one year. During this year, they will both receive the family's education and evaluation. After one year, the trust committee will vote to decide the final heir."

It was a clever move. It framed her as reasonable and fair, while keeping Jagger inside the walls of the estate. It bought her time-time to destroy Arvel and scrub Jagger's record clean.

The trustees nodded, relieved to have a compromise that didn't involve a bloody fight.

Frances remained silent. She knew Estela's game. She knew the next year would be a war of attrition. But it was the best outcome she could force right now. She had gotten Arvel through the door. That was step one.

The meeting adjourned. Estela stood, gesturing for Jagger to follow. He walked beside her, his tears miraculously dried, his face once again a mask of quiet obedience.

As they passed Frances, Estela paused. She leaned in close, her voice barely a whisper.

"The game has begun, child. I hope you don't regret it."

Frances didn't blink. "I never regret anything, Estela."

She watched them walk away, her heart pounding a steady, rhythmic beat in her chest. Round one was over. And the real fight was just beginning.

Three days had passed since the board meeting. Three days of suffocating silence in the massive Burnett estate.

Frances sat in her private suite, the screen of her laptop glowing in the dim light. A woman's face stared back at her-a therapist hired by the family to deal with her 'trauma'.

"And how have the anxiety symptoms been manifesting, Frances?" the therapist asked, her voice soft and clinical.

Frances kept her face blank. "I still have trouble sleeping," she said. "I feel on edge."

It was a lie. She wasn't on edge. She was focused. The therapy sessions were a shield, a way to explain away her strange behavior while she plotted her next move under the guise of recovery.

A soft knock on the door interrupted her. Phoebe peeked her head in. "Ma'am," she whispered. "The Mr. has returned."

Frances's stomach clenched. She turned back to the screen. "We'll have to continue this next week," she told the therapist, ending the call abruptly.

She walked to the window. Down below, a black SUV was pulling up to the front entrance. Baron stepped out, his face set in a hard line. He didn't look up at her window.

That night, the dining room was a freezer. Baron sat at the head of the long table, Frances at the other end. The distance between them felt like a canyon. He didn't speak to her. He didn't even look at her.

Instead, he chatted amiably with Estela, pointedly ignoring Frances. They discussed the weather, a recent business deal, anything and everything that didn't involve the woman sitting ten feet away.

Frances ate her meal in silence. She tasted nothing. The roasted chicken might as well have been cardboard. But she didn't complain. She didn't cry. She simply ate, her posture rigid, her face a mask of indifference.

After dinner, Baron moved to the grand parlor. Estela sat by the fire. Herta stood silently by the fireplace, her eyes missing nothing, and a few other staff members were cleaning up.

Baron spoke, his voice carrying perfectly across the room, designed to be overheard. "Frances's condition is quite worrying," he said to Estela. "Her behavior at the meeting... it was clearly a hysterical episode brought on by the trauma."

Frances was walking past the doorway. She stopped for a fraction of a second.

"She needs more patience," Baron continued, his tone dripping with false concern. "The doctor says this kind of mental instability can last for a long time."

He was labeling her. Crazy. Unstable. Hysterical. He was laying the groundwork to have her committed, to make anything she said or did the ramblings of a madwoman.

A young maid, Coral Baines, looked up from her dusting. She shot Frances a look of pure sympathy. But a sharp glare from Herta sent the girl's eyes right back to the floor.

Frances didn't stop. She didn't confront him. She simply walked up the grand staircase, her back straight, her steps measured. She would not give him the satisfaction of a breakdown.

Later that night, Frances sat in the small study adjacent to her bedroom, reviewing financial statements. The door clicked open.

Baron leaned against the doorframe, his arms crossed over his chest. He watched her with a predator's gaze, looking for a crack in her armor.

"What do you want, Frances?" he asked, his voice low and condescending. "More money? Or are you just acting out to get my attention?"

He was trying to fit her into the old box. The needy wife. The jealous woman. It was the only way he knew how to control her.

Frances closed the laptop slowly. She stood up, smoothing her robe. "I don't want anything, Baron," she said, her voice flat. "Especially not your attention."

She moved to walk past him, out of the study. But as she passed, his hand shot out. His fingers clamped around her wrist like a vise, the pressure sharp and immediate.

"Don't play games with me," he snarled, his face inches from hers. "You are still my wife."

Frances looked down at his hand, then back up at his face. There was no fear in her eyes. No love. No hate. Just a vast, empty coldness that seemed to unnerve him.

"Contractual wife," she corrected, her voice barely a whisper. "Remember? You said it yourself. We are just a business arrangement."

She twisted her arm, breaking his grip with a sudden, sharp movement. She didn't look back as she walked out of the room.

Baron stood there, staring at his empty hand. His jaw clenched. The familiar script had been torn up. He didn't know what to do with a wife who didn't want him.

Upstairs, Phoebe was waiting in Frances's bedroom. She poured a glass of warm milk and set it on the nightstand. "Ma'am," she said hesitantly. "You shouldn't have to endure this. Mr. Burnett, he's..."

Frances held up a hand, silencing her. "Phoebe, sympathy is a weapon for the weak. I don't need it."

Phoebe's mouth snapped shut. She looked at Frances, really looked at her. The woman standing before her was not the same fragile girl who had married into this family. She was someone else entirely. Someone dangerous.

Frances walked to the vanity mirror. She stared at her own reflection-the pale skin, the dark circles under her eyes. The war was just beginning. If she didn't find a way to fight back, they would bury her alive.

She picked up her phone. A new email had arrived, the sender hidden behind a string of encrypted numbers. The subject line read: Initial Report on Gia Hobbs.

Frances opened it. Her eyes scanned the text, her mind racing. If Baron wanted to play dirty, she was more than ready to get her hands muddy.

Estela's private study was a sanctuary of dark wood and heavy velvet. The fire in the hearth crackled, casting flickering shadows across the walls. But the warmth did nothing to thaw the icy tension in the room.

Baron stood before his mother's massive oak desk, his chest heaving. He threw a copy of Forbes onto the polished surface. The headline read: Burnett Heiress MIA: Trouble in Paradise?

"The media is having a field day!" Baron shouted, his voice echoing off the bookshelves. "Frances refusing to attend the charity gala? Everyone is speculating about our marriage!"

Estela sat behind the desk, calmly sipping her tea. She didn't even glance at the magazine. "I assumed you had handled her," she said, her tone dripping with disappointment.

Baron began to pace, his shoes wearing a path into the expensive rug. "She's changed! She's like a block of ice. I can't read her. I can't predict her. She just... stares."

He stopped, his hands clenching into fists at his sides. He looked at his mother, his eyes burning with a desperate, selfish need. "Bring Gia back. Now. Today."

It wasn't the first time he had made the demand, but this time, there was a violent edge to his voice.

"Jagger needs his mother," Baron argued, his tone shifting to a whine. "With Gia here, she can comfort Jagger. And she can help me 'manage' Frances."

Estela slammed her teacup down. The delicate porcelain clattered against the saucer. "I said no! The timing is wrong."

She stood up, her small frame seeming to grow larger in the firelight. "Gia Hobbs's background is a minefield. Her father is a drunk. Her mother is a gambler. And Gia herself? She left a trail of scandals in the art world just to climb the social ladder."

She pointed a bony finger at Baron. "The moment she steps foot in this estate, the press will dig up every piece of trash connected to her. And when they do, Jagger's true parentage will be exposed!"

Baron scoffed, a cruel smirk twisting his lips. "So what? Are you going to just stand by and watch Frances put that street rat Arvel on the throne?"

He leaned over the desk, getting in his mother's face. "We have to strike first! Bring Gia home. Let Jagger feel the warmth of a real family. That is our greatest weapon! Blood. A mother. That's what will win this."

Estela's face hardened. "While the legal documents are not finalized, any accident could ruin everything! Frances is a snake in the grass. She is waiting for us to slip up."

"Then we make her slip up!" Baron roared. "We can't just sit here defending! She is attacking us!"

Across the hall, hidden in the shadows of her own sitting room, Frances sat perfectly still. A tiny, flesh-colored earpiece was lodged in her left ear. A wire ran down to a receiver tucked into her waistband.

Phoebe had planted the bug in Estela's study . It was a risky move, but it was paying off in spades.

Frances listened to every word. Gia Hobbs. The name was a key turning in a lock. The background, the scandals-it was all falling into place.

In the study, the argument reached a boiling point.

"Baron," Estela warned, her voice like gravel. "I will not allow you to destroy generations of Burnett legacy over a woman."

Baron stared at his mother, his eyes dark and dangerous. He knew he had to play his trump card. He had to force her hand.

He went quiet. The silence stretched, thick and heavy. Then, he spoke, each word slow and deliberate.

"If you don't bring Gia back," Baron said, his voice barely a whisper, "I will go to the press myself and 'clarify' Jagger's parentage. Your choice, Mother."