Chapter 14 - Celeste Stops Lying
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Celeste requested to speak with prosecutors.
Her attorney arranged it.
Dominic was not present.
He did not need to be.
For eight hours, Celeste talked.
She admitted Grant first approached her after Sofia’s death.
He knew she resented Dominic.
He knew she believed Adrian had always lived in his older brother’s shadow.
And he knew money could turn resentment into action.
Grant told her the Legacy Trust was “outdated.”
He said Dominic already controlled too much.
He said placing Lily’s shares into a professionally managed company would protect everyone.
Celeste knew he would profit.
She knew she would profit too.
She claimed she did not initially understand the scale of Grant’s prior theft.
But she knew the guardianship case was false.
She knew the nursery scene was staged.
She knew Dominic was supposed to be provoked.
And she knowingly frightened an infant to create that reaction.
No excuse changed that.
Then investigators asked the question Dominic cared about most.
“Why dog food?”
Celeste looked down.
“Because I chose it.”
Not Grant.
Her.
Grant wanted a humiliating provocation involving Lily.
Celeste chose the exact method.
Why?
Her answer exposed something ugly.
“Sofia once told me I treated staff like animals.”
Silence.
“So you used her daughter?”
Celeste nodded.
“I hated her.”
“An eight-month-old baby?”
“No.”
Celeste’s voice cracked.
“I hated Sofia.”
“And you took it out on Lily.”
Celeste began crying.
“Yes.”
That confession mattered.
Grant created the scheme.
But Celeste supplied the cruelty.
She was not merely manipulated.
She participated willingly.
Prosecutors also asked whether she knew Grant had monitored Sofia.
“Yes.”
“Did you know about the stolen red-clause notice?”
“Afterward.”
“Did you help hide it?”
“No.”
Then she gave them something new.
Grant kept copies of important documents in a private safe-deposit box.
She knew the bank.
She knew the alias.
Investigators obtained proper legal process.
Inside the box they found Sofia’s missing original red-clause notice.
Unopened.
Still sealed from Julia’s law office.
Grant had taken it exactly as suspected.
Also inside—
Letters from Owen Mercer.
Grant’s son.
Owen had repeatedly warned his father to stop using Mercer Strategic Holdings for trust-related payments.
Dominic was surprised.
Owen was involved in business with North River.
But the letters suggested he did not know the full fraud.
One read:
Dad, if these payments are trust money, I want nothing to do with them.
Grant had ignored him.
The network of guilt became clearer.
Not everyone near the scheme was equally responsible.
That mattered.
Dominic wanted justice.
Not indiscriminate revenge.
Then prosecutors found one final document.
A draft dated before Sofia died.
It proposed removing Grant as trustee.
Prepared by Sofia.
Signed by Dominic?
No.
The signature line was empty.
She had been planning to bring it to him.
Dominic stared at the blank line.
If he had listened to her one week earlier—
He stopped himself.
That road had no end.
Sofia had acted.
She had left proof.
She had protected Lily.
Dominic could honor her by finishing the work instead of drowning in regret.
May you like
👉 Celeste had finally admitted that Grant designed the trap—but the cruelty toward Lily had been her own choice, and no mastermind could excuse it.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
