Old Money
The Family Crest

The Rival's Hand

August 25, 2026 · Part 6 of 10 · 2 min

"Say it," Gerald said. "Whatever it is, say it now."

Odette's eyes moved to Vanessa, almost apologetic. "Twenty years ago, a young man came to me. Desperate. He'd been courting a Merrick daughter — not you, dear, your aunt Delphine, before she moved abroad — and your grandfather refused the match. Not good enough family, he said. Not enough history behind the name."

Gerald went rigid. "Preston. That was Preston Hale."

"He never forgave the insult," Odette said. "He spent years digging through parish archives out of spite, looking for something — anything — to prove that the families who judged him weren't as pedigreed as they pretended to be. He found the Falconer forgery decades ago. I paid him to stay quiet. I thought that was the end of it."

"So this whole thing is a — a grudge?" Weston's voice cracked. "Someone waited twenty years to detonate this at my wedding?"

"I don't know if he's involved tonight," Odette admitted. "But Dr. Quill didn't stumble onto this by accident. Someone pointed him toward those ledgers. I'd wager money it was Preston."

All eyes turned to Quill, who held up both hands. "I was hired honestly, Mr. Merrick — by you. But you're right that I didn't choose which archive to search first. I received an anonymous letter three months ago, directing me to a specific parish, a specific decade. I assumed it was a helpful tip from a local historian."

"Then the records could be—" Vanessa started, a flicker of hope rising. "Could they be wrong? Planted? Could someone have forged the forgery, just to hurt us?"

Quill's face didn't offer the mercy she wanted.

"I wondered the same thing," he said. "So before I came to your father tonight, I had the original parish ledgers independently authenticated by the county archive — the real ones, held under lock for two centuries, not copies anyone could tamper with."

He set a second, older folder on the table, its wax seal already broken.

"The forgery is real," he said. "Whoever pointed me to it didn't create the lie. They just finally let it out."

Continue the story Part 7: Gerald's Ultimatum →

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