The water hit her like a punch.
Margaret stumbled backward, gasping, as the freezing spray slammed into her chest and soaked through her thin nightgown.
She was seventy years old.
She’d lived in this mansion for thirty-four years.
And now she stood shivering in her own courtyard while her son’s wife aimed a garden hose at her face and smiled.
Victoria didn’t even flinch.
Draped in an elegant green gown, jewelry glittering in the afternoon sun, she held that hose like it was nothing.
Like Margaret was nothing.
The maid—Clara—threw herself between them.
“She’s done nothing wrong!” Clara screamed, water pounding into her back.
Victoria tilted her head.
Calm. Cold.
“Then she can leave,” she said softly. “Like a servant.”
Margaret’s knees buckled.
Clara caught her before she fell.
And that’s when the door flew open.
Footsteps pounded across the stone courtyard.
Margaret looked up through soaking strands of gray hair.
Her son.
Daniel stopped ten feet away, frozen, staring at the scene in front of him.
His mother. Drenched. Trembling.
His wife. Smiling.
“Mom?”
His voice cracked.
Margaret opened her mouth but no sound came out.
Victoria didn’t move. Didn’t explain. Didn’t apologize.
She just stood there holding the hose like she’d done absolutely nothing wrong.
Daniel crossed the distance in four strides.
He ripped the hose from Victoria’s hands so hard the nozzle clattered against the stone.
Water sprayed wildly before dying into silence.
No one spoke.
No one breathed.
Then Daniel turned toward his mother.
And stepped between her and Victoria.
Shielding her.
The way Clara had.
Victoria’s smile finally cracked.
“Daniel—”
“Don’t.”
His voice was quiet.
Deadly.
Margaret had never heard him sound like that. Not once in forty years.
He turned his head slowly toward Victoria.
And the look in his eyes made even Clara step back.
“Anyone who humiliates my mother,” he said, each word falling like a stone, “has no place in this house.”
Victoria blinked.
Her mouth opened. Closed.
For the first time since Margaret had met her, the woman looked afraid.
But Margaret wasn’t watching her anymore.
She was watching her son.
