Chapter 2 - The Golden Cage of Vance Manor
Within forty minutes, I was shoved into the back of a black Maybach that glided through the iron gates of Vance Manor in Greenwich, Connecticut. Mark Vance sat across from me in the plush leather cabin, swirling a crystal tumbler of scotch. His initial shock had curdled into pure, unadulterated hatred.
"You think you’re clever, don’t you, street-rat?" Mark murmured, keeping his voice beneath the hum of the engine so the chauffeur wouldn’t hear. "I don't know who fed you Caroline’s name, or what pawnshop you looted that ring from. But Arthur is eighty-one and his heart is failing. When the coroner signs his certificate, you'll be back in an unmarked gutter where you belong."
"I didn't steal anything," I said, shrinking against the door, holding the ring tight inside my pocket.
"We’ll see about that when the lab gets your swab," he spat.
When the car stopped, the estate looked less like a home and more like a fortress. Stone gargoyles perched on slate roofs; armed private security patrolled the perimeter with Belgian Malinois straining at their leashes. Arthur didn't let Mark take me. The moment we stepped into the cathedral-sized foyer, Arthur wrapped a cashmere blanket around my shoulders and called for Dr. Sterling, the family’s private physician.
"He needs food, a hot bath, and clean clothes," Arthur commanded his household staff. "And bring the genetic testing kit immediately."
Two hours later, after scrubbing three layers of street grime off my skin and dressing in clothes that still smelled like factory packaging, I sat in Arthur’s massive study. Dr. Sterling ran a sterile cotton swab across the inside of my cheek and placed it into a sealed, barcode-labeled vial.
"Results will take twenty-four hours for a full rush panel, Mr. Vance," Sterling said softly.
"Twelve," Arthur countered without blinking. "Use every lab in the state. Pay whatever it takes."
When the doctor left, Arthur looked at me from behind his vast mahogany desk. On the wall behind him hung a massive oil painting of a girl with wild, unruly curls and sea-glass green eyes—the spitting image of the face I had watched wither away in hospice care two years ago.
"You have her jawline, boy," Arthur whispered, his voice cracking with immense grief. "Fourteen years. Fourteen years I spent hiring private investigators, mercenaries, and tech firms to find where she ran to. Why didn't she come home? Why did she let you starve in Queens?"
"Because she said you were dangerous," I answered truthfully, the innocence of a fourteen-year-old cutting through his armor. "She said if the Vances found us, they’d take me away and make sure she never woke up."
Arthur recoiled as if I had shot him in the chest. His fingers gripped the arms of his leather chair until his knuckles turned bone-white.
"I never would have harmed her," Arthur breathed, his voice hollow. "She was my only child."
"She didn't say it was you," I whispered. "She said it was *them*."
Before Arthur could reply, the heavy doors of the study swung open. Mark entered, a thin, chilling smile plastered across his face.
"Uncle Arthur, the press is already outside the gates. The *Post* has pictures of you kneeling to a beggar. We need to issue a statement denying this before the board panics tomorrow morning."
"The boy sleeps in the East Suite tonight, Mark," Arthur said coldly. "And you will treat him as my blood until science says otherwise."
May you like
Mark's eyes slid over to me. There was no denial in his stare—only the predatory calculation of a man whose inheritance was slipping through his blood-soaked fingers.
***
