Chapter 8 The Sister's Visit

# Chapter 8: The Sister's Visit

The morning sun cast long shadows across the Blackwood estate as Nina prepared for her final visitor. She had arranged the formal dining room meticulously—fine china, crystal glasses, silver cutlery polished to a mirror shine. The elegantly boxed cake sat at the center of the table, its dark ribbon a stark contrast against the white packaging.

Vanessa—or rather, the woman who had been playing Vanessa—watched from the doorway as Nina made the final adjustments to the table setting.

"You're really going through with this," she remarked, not quite a question.

Nina straightened a fork that was already perfectly aligned. "Of course. It's the final piece of the puzzle."

"And after today?"

"After today, we move forward," Nina replied. "New identities, new lives. As agreed."

The woman nodded, a hint of admiration in her expression. "You know, when I first approached you with evidence of Ernest's plans, I didn't expect you to be quite so... thorough in your response."

Nina smiled faintly. "Neither did I. But then, I never expected to die and be reborn in the same moment." She checked her watch—an elegant timepiece that had been her mother's. "She'll be here soon. Are you sure you don't want to stay?"

"No, this is your moment. Besides, my presence might complicate matters. The real Vanessa's sister-in-law should handle this alone."

With a final nod, the woman who had posed as Vanessa departed through the kitchen, leaving the mansion through the service entrance as they had planned. Nina heard the soft purr of an engine as the car pulled away, carrying with it the last person who knew the full truth of what had happened to Ernest Blackwood.

At precisely eleven o'clock, the doorbell rang. Nina took a deep breath, smoothed her charcoal gray dress—mourning attire, but with a subtle sophistication that suggested resilience rather than defeat—and went to answer it.

Margaret Winters stood on the doorstep, impeccably dressed in a cream-colored suit that accentuated her golden hair and cold blue eyes. Ernest's true sister—not the half-sister Eliza who had visited the previous day, nor the imposter who had helped Nina execute her revenge, but his full biological sister who had been officially estranged from the family for years.

"Margaret," Nina greeted her with a polite smile. "Thank you for coming."

"Your invitation was... intriguing," Margaret replied, her voice carrying the same aristocratic inflection that Ernest's had. "Though I must say, I was surprised to hear from you at all, especially so soon after my brother's unfortunate passing."

Nina stepped aside to allow her entry. "I felt it was important that we speak privately. There are matters regarding Ernest's estate that concern you directly."

Margaret's eyes narrowed slightly, but she maintained her composed demeanor as she followed Nina into the house. Her gaze swept over the foyer with the calculating assessment of someone mentally appraising each object's value.

"I was under the impression that Ernest had cut me out of his will years ago," she said as Nina led her to the dining room. "A decision he made quite clear to the entire family."

"The official will, yes," Nina confirmed, gesturing for Margaret to take a seat at the table. "But as it turns out, my husband was a man of many secrets."

Margaret's perfectly manicured fingers trailed along the back of her chair before she sat. "That doesn't surprise me in the least."

Nina took the seat opposite her, maintaining eye contact. "Would you care for some tea? Or perhaps champagne? This is, after all, a significant occasion."

"Tea would be fine," Margaret replied coolly. "Earl Grey if you have it."

Nina rang a small silver bell, and the housekeeper—newly hired after Ernest's death and unaware of the significance of today's meeting—appeared promptly to serve the tea. Once the steaming cups were placed before them and they were alone again, Nina opened the conversation in earnest.

"I'll be direct, Margaret. I know about the prenuptial agreement addendum that Ernest created. The one naming you as the beneficiary of his personal assets in the event of his death."

Margaret's expression remained impassive, but her fingers tightened almost imperceptibly around her teacup. "I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about."

"No?" Nina raised an eyebrow. "That's odd, considering your signature is on the document. As is mine—or rather, an impressive forgery of it."

A tense silence filled the room as the two women regarded each other. Finally, Margaret set down her cup with deliberate care.

"If such a document exists, it would have been drafted without my knowledge or consent," she said carefully. "Ernest and I hadn't spoken in three years."

"Publicly," Nina corrected. "You hadn't spoken publicly. But privately, you were very much in communication. Weekly calls to a burner phone. Meetings at that little cabin in Vermont that Ernest thought I didn't know about. Plans made over secure email servers."

For the first time, Margaret's composure slipped, surprise flashing briefly across her features before she recovered. "You seem to have developed quite an active imagination since my brother's death."

"Not imagination. Evidence." Nina reached into a folder beside her plate and extracted several photographs. She laid them on the table, spreading them out like a dealer distributing cards. "You and Ernest at the Vermont property. You entering his office building through the private garage entrance. The two of you having dinner at that exclusive restaurant in Montreal where you thought no one would recognize you."

Margaret glanced at the photos, her expression hardening. "Family meetings to discuss business matters that didn't concern you."

"Is that what you call plotting my murder? A 'family meeting'?" Nina's voice remained calm, almost conversational, as she dropped this bombshell.

The silence that followed was heavy with tension. Margaret's eyes darted briefly to the door, calculating her escape route.

"Don't worry," Nina assured her. "This conversation is just between us. For now."

"These are serious and completely unfounded accusations," Margaret said stiffly. "If you're attempting to intimidate me for some financial gain—"

"I have the recordings," Nina interrupted softly. "Of you and Ernest discussing the 'staircase accident' that was supposed to happen to me. The insurance payout. How you would wait a respectable year before 'reconciling' publicly with your grieving brother and taking your place in the family business."

Margaret's face had gone pale, but she maintained her rigid posture. "Recordings can be altered. No court would—"

"I'm not interested in courts," Nina cut in again. "At least, not yet. What interests me is understanding why."

She reached for the cake box, untying the ribbon with deliberate slowness. "Why you were willing to help your brother murder his wife. Why you forged my signature on legal documents. Why you were prepared to benefit from my death."

Margaret watched warily as Nina lifted the lid of the box, revealing the dark chocolate cake with its elegant silver inscription: "Till Death Do Us Part."

"Ernest's favorite," Nina explained, taking a cake knife and cutting a generous slice. "Black chocolate with a special ingredient that gives it a unique... character." She placed the slice on a fine china plate and slid it toward Margaret. "Please, have some while we talk."

Margaret eyed the cake suspiciously. "I'm not particularly hungry."

"It wasn't a suggestion," Nina said, her voice suddenly hard. "Consider it a condition of our conversation continuing privately rather than with Detective Mercer present."

After a moment's hesitation, Margaret picked up her dessert fork and took a small bite of the cake. Her expression registered surprise as she tasted it. "This is... unusually rich."

"The secret is in the processing of the cocoa," Nina explained, watching as Margaret took another, larger bite. "Now, about my question. Why did you help Ernest plan my murder?"

Margaret set down her fork, dabbing at her lips with a napkin. "You wouldn't understand. The Blackwood legacy—"

"Try me," Nina interrupted.

Margaret's ice-blue eyes—so similar to Ernest's—fixed on Nina with sudden intensity. "The Blackwood fortune was built over generations through strategic marriages and careful elimination of... obstacles. Ernest understood this. Our father understood this. You were meant to provide an heir and then gracefully exit, just as our mother did."

"Your mother didn't die of cancer as the official story claims, did she?" Nina asked, though she already knew the answer.

"A convenient explanation for a necessary transition," Margaret replied with chilling detachment. "Ernest was carrying on family tradition. Nothing personal."

"Nothing personal," Nina repeated softly. "Just murder for profit and power. How many others, Margaret? How many 'necessary transitions' has the Blackwood family arranged over the years?"

Margaret took another bite of cake, seeming to gain confidence as she spoke about the family's dark history. "More than you could imagine. The Blackwood name has endured for centuries precisely because we do what's necessary to protect our interests."

"And Ernest's first wife? Was she also a 'necessary transition'?"

"Caroline?" Margaret's lips curved in a cold smile. "She was actually an accident. Slipped in the bathtub after too much wine. But it worked out so conveniently that Ernest realized the potential of such... arrangements."

Nina nodded slowly, absorbing this confirmation of her suspicions. "And my mother? Was she necessary too?"

Margaret's fork paused halfway to her mouth. "Your mother?"

"Diana Wells. She disappeared five years ago while investigating financial irregularities at companies connected to Blackwood Industries. Ernest told me she likely committed suicide, but her body was never found."

For the first time, genuine confusion crossed Margaret's face. "I don't know anything about your mother."

"Don't you?" Nina reached into the folder again and extracted another photograph—this one of Margaret wearing elegant earrings that Nina recognized immediately. "Those belonged to my mother. They were a family heirloom, missing since the day she disappeared."

Margaret's hand moved unconsciously to her ear, where she currently wore different jewelry. "These were a gift from Ernest. He said they were from an estate sale."

"He lied," Nina said simply. "They were taken from my mother's body after he killed her. Just as he planned to take my jewelry after my 'accident' and eventually gift those pieces to you as well."

Margaret set down her fork, the remaining cake forgotten as the implications of Nina's words sank in. "If what you're saying is true—"

"It is."

"—then you have no proof that I knew about your mother. That was Ernest's action, not mine."

Nina smiled thinly. "Does it matter? You've admitted on record to conspiring to murder me. The cake you're eating is being recorded too." She gestured to a small, nearly invisible camera concealed in the floral arrangement centerpiece. "Your confession about the Blackwood family's history of strategic eliminations is quite damning."

Margaret's face hardened. "What do you want? Money? Is that what this is about?"

"No," Nina said, leaning forward slightly. "What I want is for you to understand exactly what you've lost. And what you're consuming."

She nodded toward the half-eaten cake on Margaret's plate. "That special ingredient I mentioned? It's Ernest."

Margaret's expression froze. "What?"

"The cake," Nina clarified, her voice eerily calm. "It's made with Ernest's ashes mixed into the cocoa powder. You're literally devouring your brother's remains."

Margaret's face contorted in horror. She shoved the plate away violently, nearly knocking over her teacup. "You're insane!"

"No," Nina corrected gently. "I'm thorough. A quality your brother might have appreciated under different circumstances."

Margaret stood abruptly, her chair scraping against the hardwood floor. "You won't get away with this. Whatever evidence you think you have—"

"Sit down," Nina commanded, her voice suddenly steely. "We're not finished."

Something in Nina's tone—perhaps the absolute certainty in it—caused Margaret to slowly lower herself back into her chair.

"Here's what's going to happen," Nina continued, her voice returning to its calm, measured cadence. "You're going to sign a document I've prepared, relinquishing any claim to Ernest's estate based on that forged addendum. You're going to withdraw completely from any involvement with Blackwood Industries. And you're going to leave this city and never contact me again."

"And if I refuse?" Margaret's voice was barely above a whisper.

Nina smiled. "Then Detective Mercer receives a very interesting package containing evidence of your involvement in conspiracy to commit murder. The recordings go public. And this video—" she gestured to the hidden camera, "—of you calmly discussing family murder traditions while eating your brother's remains gets uploaded to every social media platform imaginable."

Margaret's face had gone ashen. "You wouldn't."

"I died once already," Nina said softly. "It changes one's perspective on what one is willing to do."

The statement hung in the air between them, cryptic but somehow carrying the weight of absolute truth.

After a long moment, Margaret spoke again, her voice hollow. "The earrings. If they were really your mother's... Ernest never told me."

"I believe you," Nina said. "Just as I believe you'll make the right decision now."

She slid a document across the table along with an elegant fountain pen—Ernest's favorite, a cruel but fitting touch. Margaret stared at it for several seconds before finally reaching for the pen.

"You've won, Nina," she said as she signed her name with a shaking hand. "But remember this: Blackwood blood runs deeper than you know. There are others in the family who understand the importance of legacy. This isn't over."

Nina took the signed document, checking it carefully before returning it to her folder. "For you, it is. But thank you for the warning. I'll be prepared."

She stood, signaling that the meeting was concluded. "I'll show you out."

As they walked to the front door, Margaret paused in the foyer, her gaze drawn to a framed photograph of Ernest that had been placed on a side table as part of the mourning display. "He would have killed you without hesitation or remorse," she said quietly. "You know that, don't you?"

"Yes," Nina replied simply.

"And yet you called an ambulance when he collapsed. You could have let him die there in the basement."

Nina met Margaret's eyes. "I wanted him to face the consequences of his actions. Death was too easy."

"But he died anyway."

"Yes," Nina agreed. "Though not as I had planned."

This admission hung between them, neither confirmation nor denial of Nina's involvement in the dogs' attack.

Margaret nodded slowly, a new understanding dawning in her eyes. "Goodbye, Nina. I won't say I wish you well, but I do respect what you've become. Ernest always did underestimate you."

"His final mistake," Nina replied, opening the door.

As Margaret stepped out into the sunlight, she turned back one last time. "The cake... was that really him?"

Nina's smile was enigmatic. "Does it matter? The horror you felt when you believed it was real—that's what counts. That moment of recognition that you had been violated in the most intimate way possible, by consuming someone you thought you loved. That's what Ernest did to everyone around him in life. It seemed fitting he should continue the tradition in death."

Without waiting for a response, Nina closed the door, leaving Margaret alone with this final, disturbing thought.

Back in the dining room, Nina carefully packed away the remaining cake. The earrings Margaret had mentioned—the ones Ernest had "gifted" her—now rested in Nina's jewelry box. She had reclaimed this small piece of her mother through careful negotiation with Margaret weeks earlier, before Ernest's death, using the pretext of wanting to see the "estate sale find" that her husband had been so proud of purchasing.

The earrings had confirmed what Nina had long suspected: Ernest had been responsible for her mother's disappearance. That knowledge had been the final catalyst for her elaborate revenge plan.

Nina picked up the plate Margaret had used, observing the half-eaten slice of cake with its dark crumbs scattered across the fine china. She hadn't lied about the cake containing Ernest's ashes—that part was true. What she hadn't mentioned was that she had used only a small portion of the ashes, just enough to make the statement metaphorically accurate without being medically dangerous.

The recording of Margaret's confession was real too, as was the hidden camera. Nina had learned from Ernest the importance of always having leverage, of always being one step ahead.

As she cleared the table, Nina's phone buzzed with a text message from an unknown number: "It's done. M is on a flight to Switzerland. Tickets one-way as instructed. -V"

The woman who had posed as Vanessa was maintaining her surveillance of Margaret, ensuring that Ernest's sister complied with their agreement. Another layer of protection, another thread in the web Nina had woven.

Nina typed a quick response: "Thank you. Final payment transferred." Then she deleted the conversation, just as she had deleted all traces of their arrangement from her devices. In the digital age, true security meant leaving no electronic footprints.

The grandfather clock in the hallway chimed noon as Nina finished cleaning up the dining room, returning it to its pristine state. Margaret's warning about other Blackwood family members echoed in her mind. She would need to remain vigilant, to keep her guard up even as she appeared to move forward with her life as the grieving widow.

But for now, she had eliminated the most immediate threat. Ernest was gone, his sister neutralized, his legacy beginning to crumble as Detective Mercer continued his investigation into the suspicious deaths connected to Blackwood Industries.

Nina carried the cake box to the kitchen, storing it in the refrigerator for one final delivery. Tomorrow, she would pay a visit to Detective Mercer, bringing him a thoughtful homemade gift as a thank-you for his diligent work on her husband's case.

After all, what could be more innocent than a widow showing her appreciation with a slice of cake?