Days before my wedding, my father tore my bridal gown and smashed a hammer into my face so my sister could steal my billionaire fiancé.

On Friday morning, twenty-four hours before the scheduled ceremony, the San Diego County Central Detention Facility smelled of industrial carbolic soap, stale floor wax, and the cold, institutional hopelessness of concrete and steel.

Harold Mercer sat on the visitor's side of the reinforced security glass in Interview Room 4, wearing an oversized orange corrections jumpsuit that hung limply from his stooped shoulders.

He looked twenty years older than he had on Wednesday morning. His silver hair was unwashed, uncombed, sticking up in wild tufts; his hands were handcuffed to the metal table, his fingernails bitten down to the quick.

The heavy steel door on the opposite side of the glass buzzed and clicked open.

Nathan Mercer walked in, accompanied by a female court reporter wheeling a digital stenograph machine and two senior investigators from the San Diego District Attorney’s Special Prosecutions Unit.

Nathan sat down on the metal stool, pulled a thick legal binder from his briefcase, and set it on the laminate ledge beneath the security intercom.

Harold lunged toward the glass, the chains of his handcuffs rattling violently against the steel table. "Nathan! Nathan, thank God! Did you bring the bail bond paperwork?! The magistrate set my bail at five million dollars—five million! That's unconstitutional! Tell the judge I have severe hypertension! Tell him I need my heart medication!"

Nathan didn't touch the intercom. He methodically opened his binder, aligned his documents, and looked at his uncle through the scratched polycarbonate pane with the absolute, unyielding neutrality of an executioner checking his instruments.

"The bail amount was set pursuant to the District Attorney's motion regarding flight risk, Uncle Harold," Nathan stated, his voice carrying cleanly through the speaker. "Given that the investigators discovered two fake passports, fifty thousand dollars in cash, and a chartered flight itinerary to Belize in your desk drawer at Camino del Mar."

Harold’s face drained of color. He collapsed back against the metal chair, his chest heaving. "That... that was an old vacation plan..."

"You are charged with four counts of felony corporate embezzlement, two counts of grand larceny, and one count of assault with a deadly weapon with intent to commit great bodily injury," Nathan continued, reading from the certified charging document.

"The District Attorney has declined to offer a plea agreement."

"Where is Eleanor?!" Harold yelled, spittle flying against the glass. "Where is my wife?! Why isn't she here with our corporate attorneys?!"

Nathan turned a page in the binder.

"Eleanor was arrested three hours ago at a luxury consignment boutique in Newport Beach," Nathan replied calmly. "She was attempting to sell three pieces of your late mother’s jewelry that were explicitly designated as trust chattels under the 1998 Codicil. She is currently being processed in the women's facility across the bay."

Harold grabbed his head with his cuffed hands, letting out a low, guttural groan of pure, unadulterated agony. "And Chloe? What about my daughter?"

"Chloe has been dropped from her modeling agency," Nathan said, closing the binder with a sharp, concussive snap. "Her social media accounts have been banned for violating hate speech and harassment terms after she posted threats against the catering staff who witnessed the assault. She is currently living in a motel room near the interstate, funded by a weekly stipend drawn from the county welfare department."

Harold stared through the glass, his eyes wide, bloodshot, and completely broken.

"Tell Evelyn..." Harold whimpered, tears cutting dirty tracks through the grime on his face. "Tell Evelyn I’m her father. Tell her... tell her she can't let me die in prison. Tell her to drop the charges."

Nathan stood up from the stool, buttoned his tailored suit jacket, and looked down at the ruined shell of the man who had ruled the Mercer family with an iron fist for thirty years.