Chapter 7 - The Angle of Truth
"The venue told my mother that the pool terrace cameras were offline for maintenance," I said, remembering my mother’s triumphant smirk when the police initially arrived at the venue.
"That was true for the country club's public security system," Clara replied smoothly. "However, one of my grandson's friends is a drone photography enthusiast. He had an aerial rig hovering above the rose garden to capture cinematic b-roll of the sunset. Look."
The high-definition video played with horrifying clarity.
The footage showed the edge of the pool. Vanessa stood in her cascading white dress, her back partially turned to the crowd, pretending to pose. I sat in my wheelchair beside her, clearly uncomfortable, trying to wheel myself backward away from the water.
Then, the camera zoomed in. Vanessa reached out, grabbed the leather handles of my chair, shoved it violently toward the edge, and gave me a brutal, two-handed shove against my chest as the wheels slipped over the wet marble.
The video even captured the split-second sneer on Vanessa's face—a smile of pure, unadulterated malice—before she spun around, clasped her hands to her cheeks, and pretended to scream in horror.
Even more damning: the camera panned to Evelyn standing by the bar. The moment I plunged into the water, my mother didn't drop her champagne glass. She checked her gold watch, nodded slightly, and only then began shouting at the guests to put their phones away.
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"This is attempted murder," I whispered, tears spilling onto the screen.
"It is," Clara agreed. "And it is your weapon. But you cannot strike until the trap is fully sprung."
