The silence that followed was deafening.

Vanessa backed away slowly, her heels crunching on the broken crystal glass scattered across the floor.

“It’s a deep fake,” Vanessa stammered, her eyes wild. “Someone edited the video! I was at a charity gala the night Michael died! I have pictures!”

“You were at a gala,” Rebecca agreed calmly. “You left at eight-thirty, claiming you had a migraine. The crash happened at nine.”

Luca stared at Vanessa, his face a mask of pure agony.

“You killed my brother.”

“NO!” Vanessa shrieked. “It was an accident! He wouldn’t listen to reason! He was going to expose the offshore accounts! He was going to ruin the company!”

“So you ran his car off the road?” Luca roared, finally losing his legendary temper.

“I didn’t push the car!” Vanessa cried, pointing at Frank. “Frank did! He put it in neutral and shoved it while Michael was unconscious!”

Frank jumped up from his chair.

“You hit him in the head with a tire iron!” Frank screamed back, completely throwing Vanessa under the bus. “I just helped you stage the crash!”

The guests gasped in absolute horror. Two women hurriedly grabbed their coats and ran toward the front door.

Teresa covered Lily’s ears, weeping silently into her granddaughter’s hair.

I stood there, horrified, realizing that for eleven months, I had been serving coffee to a murderer.

Luca closed his eyes, taking a deep, shuddering breath. When he opened them, the sorrow was gone. Only a chilling, terrifying calm remained.

“Marcus,” Luca said softly.

The massive security guard stepped forward.

“Yes, boss.”

“Lock the front doors. Nobody leaves.”

Marcus pulled a heavy set of keys from his belt and locked the grand oak doors. The metallic click echoed through the room like a gunshot.

Vanessa panicked. She grabbed a steak knife from the dining table and held it out in front of her.

“Stay back! Luca, I did it for us! We were going to be a power couple! Michael was weak, he didn’t deserve to run the empire!”

Luca didn’t flinch at the knife. He just looked at her with pity.

“You’re not a power couple, Vanessa. You’re a parasite.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone.

“I called the police twenty minutes ago,” Luca said. “When my mother showed me Michael’s rosary in your room.”

Vanessa’s eyes widened in terror.

Sirens began to wail in the distance, growing louder by the second.

“You set me up!” Vanessa screamed, looking at Teresa. “You old witch! You planned this!”

Teresa didn’t look scared. She looked fiercely proud.

“I promised my son I would protect his daughter,” the old woman said simply. “I keep my promises.”

Vanessa realized she was trapped. She dropped the knife and lunged toward the back hallway, trying to escape through the kitchen.

But she tripped over her own elegant red gown.

She crashed to the floor, her diamond necklace snapping and scattering stones across the marble.

I walked over and stood right in front of her.

Vanessa looked up at me, her face smeared with mascara, her perfect image shattered.

“Move, you pathetic little maid!” she hissed.

I didn’t move.

Instead, I looked down at her bare wrist.

“When I was cleaning your room yesterday,” I said quietly, “I found something else. Under your mattress.”

Vanessa froze.

I reached into my apron pocket and pulled out a heavy, men’s silver bracelet.

It was severely scratched, and one of the links was broken.

“Michael wore this on his right wrist,” I said. “He was wearing it the night he died. I saw it in a photograph Mrs. Moretti showed me.”

Luca walked over and took the bracelet from my hand.

He looked at Vanessa, who was still trembling on the floor.

“You kept trophies,” Luca whispered, utterly disgusted.

Red and blue police lights began flashing through the dining room windows. Heavy pounding echoed against the front door.

“Chicago Police! Open up!”

Marcus unlocked the doors, and six armed officers flooded into the mansion.

Frank immediately dropped to his knees, putting his hands on his head. “It was her idea! I’ll testify! It was all her idea!”

Two officers yanked Vanessa off the floor and slammed her into handcuffs.

As they dragged her past me, Vanessa stopped struggling for a second. She glared at me with pure, venomous hatred.

“You think you won?” she spat. “You’re just a maid. You’ll be scrubbing toilets for the rest of your life.”

I looked her dead in the eye.

“Maybe,” I said. “But at least I won’t be doing it in prison.”