Chapter 18
The trial was three months later.
It was the trial of the decade.
Every major news network covered it gavel to gavel. Experts debated every detail on twenty-four-hour news cycles. The public was divided—those who believed Vanessa was a monster, and those who believed she was a beautiful woman framed by a rich, unstable husband.
The prosecution’s case was ironclad.
They played the phone calls.
They played the security footage.
They showed Ethan’s videos—every brutal, heartbreaking minute of them.
They put Daniel, Sofia, and James on the stand. One by one, they told their stories. The courtroom wept. Even the hardened reporters dried their eyes.
The defense tried everything.
They attacked the children’s credibility.
They attacked Michael’s mental state.
They tried to have the evidence thrown out on technicalities.
They put Vanessa on the stand in her final, greatest performance. She cried. She trembled. She told the jury she had only ever wanted to be loved. That Michael had abused her. That the children had been coached. That all the evidence had been fabricated.
It was masterful.
Half the jury was crying with her by the time she finished.
But the prosecution had one final witness.
Marcus Reed.
He had cut a deal—testify against his sister in exchange for immunity on the murder charges. He took the stand in his orange prison jumpsuit, his tattoos visible, his voice rough.
He told them everything.
How Vanessa had been planning Michael’s murder for six months.
How she had researched poisons, accidents, alibis.
How she had sent him the money to buy the gasoline and the gun.
How she had stood over Michael’s body and laughed when she thought he was dead.
“Did you love your sister?” the prosecutor asked him.
Marcus looked at Vanessa. She was staring at him with murder in her eyes.
“Once,” he said. “When we were kids. Before she learned that people are just things you use until you don’t need them anymore. She killed two men. She hurt five kids. She would have killed me too eventually, once I was no longer useful. She doesn’t love anyone, Counselor. Not even me. Especially not me.”
The jury deliberated for four days.
On the fifth day, they came back.
Guilty on all counts.
Attempted murder.
Arson.
Conspiracy to commit murder.
Multiple counts of child abuse.
Violation of a restraining order.
The judge sentenced her to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Plus an additional seventy-five years for the other charges.
Vanessa didn’t react when the verdict was read.
She didn’t cry. She didn’t scream. She just sat there, her face blank, her eyes dead.
As they led her away in chains, she didn’t look at Michael. She didn’t look at the children. She didn’t look at her brother.
She looked straight ahead.
May you like
At nothing.
At everything she had lost.
