Chapter 7 - THE RECKONING AT CEDAR HILLSCedar Hills Private Sanitarium was an exclusive, heavily guarded facility nestled in the foggy hills north of the city, reserved exclusively for the ultra-wealthy who needed to hide their scandals away from the public eye.
A sleek black convoy pulled up to the wrought-iron gates. The guards took one look at the Moretti crest on the license plates and immediately buzzed them through without a single question.
Grace and Dante walked down the pristine, white-tiled hallway of the VIP wing, their footsteps echoing in the eerie silence. They stopped outside Room 402. Through the glass window, the elder Whitman could be seen sitting in a plush leather armchair, staring blankly at a television playing old black-and-white movies.
Grace pushed the door open. The heavy mahogany door clicked shut behind them.
The old man turned his head slowly, his cloudy eyes squinting against the light. When he recognized the tall, imposing figure of Dante Moretti—and beside him, the stunning, regal woman in a tailored white trench coat—his jaw dropped.
"Y-You..." the elder Whitman wheezed, clutching the arms of his chair. "You're... you're that woman. The... the outcast."
Grace walked slowly toward him, her heels clicking rhythmically against the floor. She stopped two feet away, looking down at him with cold, absolute detachment.
"Outcast?" Grace repeated softly. "No, Mr. Whitman. Outcasts sleep on park benches in the rain. Queens sit on thrones. And you... you are just an old, broken man waiting in a cage."
The old man’s face flushed with a mixture of terror and lingering arrogance. "You have no right to be here! This is private property! I demand you—"
"You demand nothing," Dante interrupted, stepping forward and tossing a thick manila folder onto the old man’s lap. "Your son lost everything. The company is gone. The mansion is seized. And this facility? I bought it this morning."
The elder Whitman frantically opened the folder, his trembling fingers scattering the papers across the floor. Every page bore the seal of Moretti Holdings—and his name listed as a tenant facing immediate eviction for non-payment of rent.
"No... No, you can't do this!" the old man shrieked, his voice cracking into panic. "I am a Whitman! We built this city! We made families like yours—"
"You made nothing," Grace interrupted, her voice cutting through his hysterics like a scalpel. She leaned down slightly, her dark eyes piercing straight into his soul. "You believed that boys were strength and girls were weakness. You believed that because my children were female, they were disposable."
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She stood back up, smoothing her coat with effortless elegance.
"Well, look at me now, old man," Grace whispered. "A woman with three daughters beat your entire dynasty into the dirt without firing a single shot. Remember that when you're packing your bags for the public shelter tomorrow."
