"My 7-month pregnant wife refused to leave the bed—then I pulled back her blanket and caught my mother’s reaction."

"She... she did it, Marcus," Clara wept, her voice cracking into raw, agonizing threads. "Every afternoon... when you left for the hardware store... she came here with her master key. She told me if I tried to walk, if I tried to leave the apartment, or if I told you... she would use her legal power of attorney to put me in a psychiatric facility and take our baby the moment it was born!"

My stomach plunged into an icy abyss.

"Power of attorney?" I repeated, my eyes whipping back to my mother. "What power of attorney?!"

Brenda stepped further into the bedroom, her polished heels clicking sharply against the hardwood floorboards. She reached into her expensive designer leather handbag and pulled out a thick document pouch bound by a red notary seal.

"Three months ago, Marcus," Brenda explained deadpan, her voice completely devoid of human warmth, "before Clara stopped working at the clinic, she signed a voluntary medical power of attorney granting me full guardianship in the event of prenatal psychological distress. I have certified reports from Dr. Arthur Vance—your uncle—stating that Clara suffers from severe gestational psychosis."

"She tricked me!" Clara shrieked, clutching my wrist with a desperate, terrified strength. "She brought papers from the bank and told me they were life insurance forms for the baby! I didn't know what I was signing!"

Brenda smirked, tapping the legal folder against her palm. "It doesn't matter what you thought, Clara. The signature is notarized. Dr. Vance has already signed the court commitment papers. By six o'clock tonight, a medical transport team will arrive to take you to the Vance Private Sanitarium in Lake Forest."

She looked at me, her eyes cold as granite.

"You should thank me, Marcus," Brenda said softly. "A girl from a low-income family with no inheritance isn't fit to be the mother of the next heir to Vance Enterprises. Once the child is delivered by Dr. Vance’s team, we'll raise the baby at the estate. Clara will be quietly settled in a permanent care facility."

I stared at the woman who had raised me—a woman who had spent twenty-eight years pretending to be a loving, devoted mother, only to reveal herself as a cold, sociopathic monster willing to torture a pregnant woman to secure corporate inheritance rights.

"Get out," I whispered.