Mia: Read the names on this document, Evelyn!
Evelyn: Put that paper away right now!
Mia: It's signed by the chief medical officer of St. Jude's Hospital on May 14th, 1998!
The paper showed two live birth registrations under the name of Arthur Vance and Evelyn Vance. Twin A: Isabella Vance. Twin B: Mia Vance.
Isabella: You told everyone I was dead! You told my father I died in the delivery room!
Mia: She didn't just tell people I died, Isabella. She paid a nurse to carry me out the back door of the hospital!
Evelyn: That is a complete fabrication! This girl is trying to ruin our family's reputation!
Isabella: Mother... answer me! Is this birth certificate real?
Evelyn's breath hitched in her chest. She adjusted her gold embroidered gown, her eyes darting nervously toward the security guards at the door.
Evelyn: Isabella, darling, listen to your mother. This is a scam organized by our business competitors!
Isabella: Don't call me darling! Look at the state seal on this paper!
Isabella grabbed the birth certificate from Mia's hand, her eyes scanning the official signatures at the bottom.
Isabella: The notary seal is real... The hospital record number matches my own birth file!
Mia: Because I was born two minutes after you, Isabella.
Isabella: Why, Mother? Why would you tell me my twin sister was dead?
Evelyn: She was a sick baby! She was weak!
Mia: I wasn't sick, Evelyn! I was healthy! But your husband's trust fund had a specific clause!
Isabella: What clause?
Mia: Our grandfather's will stated that if Arthur had twin heirs, the estate trust would be split equally between both daughters, controlled by an independent trustee until we turned twenty-eight!
Isabella: But if there was only one child...
Mia: If there was only one living child, the surviving mother got full legal control of the entire forty-million-dollar estate until the child turned thirty!
The entire ballroom erupted into loud chatter. Guests pulled out their phones, taking photos of the birth certificate held in Isabella's shaking hands.
Guest C: Evelyn hid her own child to keep control of the trust fund?
Guest D: That's forty million dollars! She committed fraud against her own family!
Evelyn: Quiet, all of you! Mind your own business!
Isabella: Is it true, Mother? Did you give away my sister for money?
Evelyn: I did what I had to do to protect our family's future!
Isabella: Protect our future? You stole my sister from me!
Mia: She paid a midwife ten thousand dollars to drop me off at a foster home in South Carolina.
Evelyn: You were raised in a safe house! You had food and shelter!
Mia: I was raised in three different foster homes while you bought gold gowns and threw million-dollar parties with my father's money!
Isabella: You made me grow up believing I was alone in this world!
Evelyn: Isabella, please... you have to understand! Your father was going to leave everything to a trust!
Isabella: My father wanted both of his daughters to be loved!
Isabella turned around and looked at Mia. The red scratch on Mia's cheek was swollen, a mark from the slap Isabella had delivered just minutes earlier. Tears filled Isabella's eyes as she reached out a hand.
Isabella: Mia... I slapped you. I didn't know...
Mia: You didn't know the truth, Isabella. But now you do.
Evelyn: Don't touch her, Isabella! She's a threat to our estate!
Isabella: Shut up, Mother! Don't say another word!