Chapter 17 - The Ashes of the Empire
The intensive care unit at St. Jude’s Hospital smelled of antiseptic and ozone. The steady beep-beep-beep of the heart monitor was the only sound anchoring Elena to reality.
It had been forty-eight hours since the boardroom. Forty-eight hours since the media exploded with the story of the century. The torn wedding dress, the fake death, the hitmen, the embezzlement—it was playing on every news network globally. The Sterling stock had tanked initially, then stabilized when Julian released a pristine, highly coordinated press statement announcing the return of the biological heir.
Elena sat in a plastic chair beside the hospital bed, staring at the woman sleeping under the thin white sheets.
Victoria looked impossibly fragile. The bullet had done severe damage, but Doc Vance’s gritty surgery had kept her alive long enough for the trauma team at St. Jude’s to finish the job.
Slowly, Victoria’s eyelids fluttered. She let out a dry, rattling breath and turned her head.
Her eyes, hazy with painkillers, focused on Elena.
For a long moment, neither woman spoke. The weight of twenty-three lost years hung between them, heavy and suffocating.
“You’re wearing the ring,” Victoria whispered, her voice barely a rasp.
Elena looked down at her right hand. “I used it. Arthur is in federal custody. The board is temporarily suspended pending an internal investigation. Julian is managing the fallout with the press.”
Victoria closed her eyes, a single tear slipping down her pale cheek. “You saved my company. You saved my life. And I… I tore your dress.”
The absurdity of the statement, the sheer inadequacy of it in the face of everything that had happened, caught Elena off guard. She let out a choked sound that was half-laugh, half-sob.
“Yes,” Elena said, her voice trembling. “You did.”
“I’m sorry,” Victoria wept, the tough, billionaire exterior melting away to reveal the broken, grieving mother beneath. “I was so angry. I thought you were taking the only family I had left. I didn't know you were the piece of my soul I’d been missing.”
Elena reached out. Her hand hesitated for a fraction of a second before her fingers wrapped around Victoria’s cold, trembling hand.
“I spent my whole life hating the mother who abandoned me,” Elena said softly, tears finally spilling over her lashes. “Then I found out she didn't abandon me; she was just lost in the dark, too. We can't get those years back, Victoria. I don't know how to be a Sterling. I don't know how to be your daughter.”
Victoria squeezed Elena’s hand with surprising strength.
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“Then we learn,” Victoria whispered fiercely. “I will spend every day of the rest of my life making it up to you, Elizabeth. Or Elena. Whichever name you choose. You are my blood. You are my heart.”
Elena squeezed back. “Elena. My name is Elena. But... I think I'd like to get to know my mother.”
