Chapter 15 - The New Dynasty
The federal courtroom was packed to the absolute legal limit. Flashbulbs popped outside the tall oak doors, and reporters crowded the corridors, but inside the chamber, an oppressive, reverent silence prevailed. Clara walked down the center aisle, her posture unyielding, her head held high. She wore a simple, elegant black blazer over a tailored white blouse—no longer hiding behind the royal blue satin dress of a frightened debutante, but standing tall as the rightful guardian of her family’s true name.
Behind the defendant's table sat Richard and Eleanor, both dressed in standard orange jumpsuits, their hands cuffed to steel loops bolted to the wooden table. Richard looked ten years older, his graying hair uncombed, his eyes hollow and defeated as he stared at the polished floorboards. Eleanor sat beside him, weeping silently into her cuffed hands, her previous vanity stripped away entirely by the cold reality of justice.
Federal Judge Sterling—no relation, though the irony was not lost on the courtroom—adjusted his reading glasses, looking down from his elevated mahogany bench at the thick stack of forensic files and master video drives resting before him.
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