Mark: Aunt Elena, sit down on that couch right now and don't move an inch.
Elena: You can't order me around, Mark! I am the matriarch of this family!
Mark: You're a criminal accessory, and the police are going to be here very shortly.
Elena: Julian will protect me! Our lawyers will bury both of you!
Chloe: Your lawyers won't be able to save either of you once the federal marshals see the audit reports.
Elena: What audit reports? There are no reports!
Chloe: I filed them this morning before the shower started, Elena.
Chloe slowly pushed herself up onto her elbows, ignoring the searing agony in her stomach as her expression transformed from unbearable pain into a fierce, cold, vengeful glare. The vulnerability in her eyes was entirely gone, replaced by an unyielding wall of absolute steel. Elena took an involuntary step backward, suddenly realizing that the bruised young woman on the floor was no longer a helpless target—she was an apex predator holding all the cards.
Elena: You... you filed a federal audit against my son?
Chloe: I filed grand larceny, fraud, and embezzlement charges against both Julian and his precious mother.
Mark: Good for you, Chloe. That's the only way to deal with thieves.
Elena: You ruined our family! You ruined our entire legacy over a petty dispute!
Chloe: A petty dispute? You struck me in my own home, hit my unborn child with a metal rod, and tried to murder me for money.
Elena: Nobody saw the rod! We can claim it was an accident during a struggle!
Chloe: Tell that to the live security camera streaming every single second of this room to my legal team's cloud server.
Elena's knees finally gave out, and she collapsed heavily onto the armchair behind her, the color draining entirely from her face. The reality of a fifteen-year maximum-security prison sentence crashed down upon her shoulders with crushing weight. Outside the living room windows, the wailing sirens of approaching police cruisers and an emergency ambulance tore through the suburban street, their flashing red and blue lights painting the walls in violent, rhythmic strokes.