Chapter 4 - THE RING IN HER LOCKER
Iris had never been handcuffed before.
The officers were not rough, but humiliation did not need bruises to hurt.
Vanessa stood with one hand pressed dramatically to her chest while Preston explained that, in the confusion after the incident, staff lockers had been checked and the missing ring found in Iris’s bag.
Iris stared at Henderson.
“You planted it.”
Henderson looked sick.
“I—I just opened the locker. Mr. Heartwell said—”
Preston cut across him. “Careful.”
Roman stepped between Iris and the officers.
“My attorney will accompany her statement.”
One of the officers recognized the name on the lawyer’s card and straightened immediately. Roman Cross did not need to raise his voice to change the air in a room.
At the station, Iris gave her account while Roman’s lawyer, Lydia Marsh, sat beside her. Elena waited outside with a composure that made the young desk sergeant visibly nervous.
The officers returned less than an hour later with measured politeness.
“You’re not being charged tonight, Miss Dalton,” one of them said. “But the complaint remains open pending review.”
Meaning the stain remained even without the handcuffs.
Outside, Roman said, “Preston moved fast.”
“He was ready,” Iris answered.
Elena nodded. “Because the witness statements were only one layer.”
Back at Elena’s townhouse, Lydia spread papers across a dining table.
“Preston filed something else tonight,” she said.
Roman’s gaze lifted sharply.
“A competency petition.”
Iris looked between them.
Elena answered before Roman could.
“Preston is claiming I am no longer fit to manage the Cross Foundation and the manor lease.”
“He wants the court to appoint interim supervision,” Lydia said. “If he gets that, he can argue the development package should proceed without Elena’s direct approval.”
Roman went still.
“He loses the signature, so he tries to take the signer.”
Elena sat down slowly, but there was no weakness in her eyes.
“Arthur warned me something like this could happen.”
Iris frowned.
“Who’s Arthur?”
“My husband,” Elena said. “Roman’s father. He created the foundation and the original stewardship terms for Heartwell Manor.”
Roman rested a hand on the table.
“Preston knows he cannot force Mother to sign while she remains legally competent. So now he will say I’m manipulating her and Iris is a thief.”
Lydia slid over a copy of the complaint inventory.
Vanessa Sterling’s diamond ring.
Recovered from employee locker.
No blood or trace report yet.
Iris’s head snapped up.
“No trace report?”
Roman looked at the page.
Then at Iris’s bandage.
Vanessa’s ring had cut her.
Which meant, if the police had the real ring, blood might still be caught under the setting.
He looked up slowly.
“Get a forensic rush on the ring.”
Lydia understood instantly.
If Iris’s blood was on it, the story changed.
If it was not, Iris was trapped.
May you like
And as the clock neared midnight, Lydia’s phone lit up with a message from the court clerk.
The competency hearing had been set for forty-eight hours later.
