Chapter 1 - THE TWO-DOLLAR FLOWER
Caroline shoved the pink plastic flower into my hand before I had even finished sitting down.
“A two-dollar flower is plenty for you, Mom.”
Twenty people around the garden table stopped talking.
For Mother’s Day, my daughter had invited both families to the stone house in Villanova where she lived with her husband, Ryan. White peonies filled the tables. Champagne chilled beside silver buckets. A caterer had arranged lemon cakes and miniature crab rolls beneath striped umbrellas.
I looked down at the plastic flower.
The price sticker was still attached.
Then Caroline turned toward Susan Mercer, her mother-in-law.
Her entire face changed.
“Now yours.”
She placed a dark velvet box in Susan’s lap, followed by a cream envelope tied with ribbon.
Susan opened the box first.
The diamond ring caught the afternoon sun.
Someone whispered, “Good Lord.”
Then she opened the envelope.
Two weeks aboard a luxury Mediterranean cruise.
Susan covered her mouth while Ryan raised his champagne glass.
I did not move.
Three days earlier, Bennett House Interiors’ accounts-payable manager had sent me a photograph of an invoice for $19,840 coded as “executive client appreciation.”
The vendor was a jeweler in King of Prussia.
A second charge for $14,600 had been labeled “European market research.”
It belonged to a cruise line.
Caroline was our vice president of finance.
She knew exactly what those codes meant.
Ryan gripped the back of my chair and dragged it several inches away from the table.
“Smile, Dorothy. Today is for the family that matters.”
I looked at my daughter.
She did not tell him to stop.
Instead, she put one arm around Susan while guests applauded the cruise.
I reached into my bag and removed the blue folder I had brought with me.
Caroline’s smile disappeared.
“You bought her diamonds and that cruise with my company’s money.”
She lunged across the table.
I pulled the folder back and stood.
“Give me that.”
“No.”
Ryan stepped toward me.
“What exactly are you accusing my wife of?”
I slid one document free.
Not an expense report.
A property deed.
I held it low enough that only the three of them could see the owner listed on the first page.
Ryan’s expression collapsed.
Caroline grabbed his arm.
I looked directly at him.
“Ryan, ask your wife whose name is on your house.”
He stared at the deed.
May you like
Then at Caroline.
“You told me she transferred it three years ago.”
