"Derrick, step back," Arthur ordered, his voice tight and breathless. "Go wait by the front gate. Make sure the valet keeps the driveway clear."
The guard blinked, glancing at Chloe in confusion. "Mr. Vance, Miss Chloe just said—"
"I don't care what she said!" Arthur snapped, a bead of sweat rolling down his silver-haired temple. He caught himself as several guests raised their eyebrows, and he quickly forced a tight, trembling smile onto his face. "Everything is fine. Just a minor misunderstanding. Go on, Derrick."
The guard hesitated, gave Marcus one last puzzled look, and walked back out through the massive glass entryway.
Chloe stared at her boss, her mouth slightly open, the heavy gold necklace at her throat rising and falling with her shallow breaths. "Arthur? Look at him. Look at what he’s wearing. He’s claiming his name is on the deed to the Sterling Crest estate! It’s obviously a forgery printed at a public library."
Marcus didn't flinch at the insult. He stood beside the gold-and-glass coffee table, his posture slightly stooped from decades of hard labor, yet grounded like an old oak tree. His worn leather bag hung from his left hand, the frayed strap resting against his charcoal-gray trousers.
"Look at the seal, young lady," Marcus said, his voice deep, unhurried, and carrying clearly across the silent room. "Press your thumb against the bottom right corner. Libraries don't have the Los Angeles County Recorder’s brass embosser from 1998."
Chloe looked down at the paper in her hands. Unconsciously, her manicured thumb brushed over the raised, crinkled ridge of the dark blue notary stamp and the county seal beside it. The paper wasn't bright modern copy paper; it was thick, slightly yellowed cotton-blend bond, creased from years inside the manila envelope.
Arthur reached them, practically snatching the deed out of Chloe’s hands before anyone else could lean in to read it. He folded it in half, pressing it tightly against his expensive suit jacket.
"Marcus," Arthur said, his voice dropping an octave into a forced, overly warm whisper. He reached out as if to place a guiding hand on the old man's faded khaki shoulder, then stopped himself an inch away when Marcus’s sharp brown eyes locked onto his fingers. "My God, Marcus. Everyone thought you moved out of state ten years ago. Come, let’s not do this out here. My private office is right down the hall. I have some wonderful single-malt Scotch, and we can sit down and—"
"I don't drink Scotch, Arthur," Marcus said evenly. He didn't lower his voice. He spoke at a normal, conversational volume that allowed every billionaire and developer within thirty feet to hear every syllable. "And I'm comfortable right here."
A tall man in a linen blazer near the infinity pool doors lowered his champagne glass onto a side table. He leaned toward his wife, whispering loudly enough to carry, "Did Arthur just call him by his first name?"
Chloe’s arrogance was rapidly curdling into humiliation. She stepped between the two men, her pearl-white blazer rustling. "Arthur, why do you know him? I spent six months staging and marketing this property. This estate belongs to the Horizon Pacific Development Group. The title was cleared in April!"
"Chloe, shut up and go check on the caterers," Arthur hissed through his teeth, his fake smile twitching violently.
"I will not go check on the caterers!" she whispered back fiercely, her cheeks flushing bright red beneath her makeup. "Mr. and Mrs. Keaton are standing right over there ready to make an all-cash offer of nineteen-point-five million! If there is a lunatic claiming ownership in the middle of my open house, I have a right to know why you aren't calling the Beverly Hills Police!"
Marcus looked slowly around the vast living room. His gaze lingered on the crystal chandelier, then moved toward the floor-to-ceiling glass windows framing the manicured lawn and the towering palms outside. A quiet, painful shadow crossed his wrinkled face—not the look of a con man looking for a payout, but the heavy ache of a man looking at a place that had been hollowed out and paved over.
"There used to be forty Meyer lemon trees right where that pool sits," Marcus said softly.
The room grew even quieter.
"My father planted the first row in 1962," Marcus continued, turning his gaze back to Arthur Vance. "And I signed the 1998 land trust with your senior partner in a little stucco office on Wilshire Boulevard. You were thirty-two years old, Arthur. You sat in the corner chair and notarized the transfer limit yourself."