Victoria: You... You slapped me! You hit a woman in your own home!
Lucas: I defended my son from an attempted murder, Victoria!
Victoria: That was not murder! I was disciplining a child who doesn't belong here!
Lucas: Pick up that clipboard right now and look at the heading!
Victoria's chest heaved as she pushed herself up on one elbow, her disheveled blonde hair falling across her face.
A bright red scratch mark burned across her cheekbone where Lucas's ring had grazed her skin.
Victoria: I don't need to read it! My private investigator told me your college girlfriend had debts!
Lucas: Clara died in a car accident twenty months ago, Victoria! Don't you dare drag her name through your filth!
Victoria: She was an opportunistic waitress who trapped you with a baby to get into our social circle!
Lucas: Clara never asked for a single dime from my trust fund! She raised Noah in a two-bedroom apartment while I finished my naval service!
Victoria: Well, she played you for a fool, Lucas! The boy is somebody else's son!
Lucas knelt down on one knee, picking up the black clipboard with two fingers and tossing it directly into her lap.
Lucas: Look at the patient identification code at the top left corner, Victoria.
Victoria hesitated, her manicured fingers trembling as she pulled the heavy paper out from under the metal clip.
Her eyes scanned the bold black letters printed across the top of the formal laboratory sheet: DNA TEST RESULTS - PATERNITY EXCLUSION ANALYSIS.
Victoria: See? It says paternity exclusion right there!
Lucas: Keep reading, Victoria. Read the name of the alleged father listed on line two.
Victoria adjusted the paper under the bright foyer light, her lips parting as her eyes drifted down to the bold type.
Victoria: Alleged Father... Richard Vance?
Lucas: Does that name sound familiar to you, Victoria?
Victoria's face turned completely white, the blood draining from her lips until she looked like a marble statue.
Victoria: Richard Vance... That's my father...
Lucas: That's right. Your father, the senior managing trustee of Vance Financial.
Victoria: Why... Why would my father's DNA be compared to this child?
Lucas: Because that isn't Noah's test, you arrogant fool. That is the test I ran on your five-year-old sister, Chloe!
Victoria dropped the paper onto the marble floor, gasping for air as if she had been plunged into icy water.
Victoria: Chloe? My little sister Chloe?!
Lucas: Your father told everyone your mother adopted Chloe from an overseas charity program after their marriage renewal.
Victoria: She was adopted! We attended the court hearing in Boston!
Lucas: That adoption was a legal cover-up, Victoria. Chloe is your father's biological child with his secret mistress in Chicago!
Victoria grabbed her head with both hands, shaking her head in frantic denial as tears of pure horror welled in her eyes.
Victoria: No... No! That's impossible! My parents have been happily married for thirty years!
Lucas: Your father embezzled eight million dollars from the Sterling corporate reserves to buy a penthouse for Chloe's real mother!
Victoria: You're lying! You forged this document to humiliate my family!
Lucas: Turn the page over, Victoria. Look at the second laboratory sheet stapled behind it.
Victoria's hands shook so hard she could barely separate the sheets of paper as she flipped to the next page.
There, stamped with the official gold seal of the Department of Health, was Noah's actual genetic sequencing report.
Lucas: Read line four aloud. Let everyone in this room hear the truth.
Victoria swallowed hard, her voice cracking into a dry, broken whisper.
Victoria: 'Biological Paternity Confirmation: Lucas Daniel Sterling and Noah James Sterling... Ninety-nine point nine-nine percent match.'
Noah cooed softly in Lucas's arms, resting his bruised chin against his father's collarbone as the truth filled the silent foyer.
Lucas: Noah is my son. My flesh, my blood, and the sole legal owner of this entire house.
Victoria slumped against the bottom step of the staircase, the black clipboard slipping from her grasp as the heavy front doors swung open once again.