Chapter 6 - Ivy Had Been Punished for Finding a Receipt
The cruelty became worse after Ivy found something she wasn’t supposed to see.
Three months before the dinner, the child walked into Vanessa’s dressing room looking for colored pencils.
A shopping bag sat open on the floor.
Inside was the diamond necklace box.
Ivy thought it was beautiful.
Then she saw a receipt.
She could read enough to recognize her own name printed near the top.
Ivy Moretti Bedroom Project.
She took the receipt to Vanessa.
“Why is my name on your necklace?”
A simple question.
Vanessa’s expression changed.
She snatched the paper away.
“You were snooping.”
“I was looking for pencils.”
“You don’t go through my things.”
“But why—”
“Enough.”
That evening Ivy lost dinner.
The next day Vanessa took away her favorite dress.
Then new clothes stopped appearing almost completely.
Vanessa told Rosa:
“She needs to understand that expensive things don’t grow on trees.”
The irony would have been absurd if it weren’t so cruel.
Ivy had accidentally found evidence that money supposedly spent on her was funding Vanessa.
From that point forward, Vanessa’s control intensified.
Not because she feared a seven-year-old could understand financial fraud.
Because Ivy kept asking questions.
Children repeat unanswered questions.
May you like
And every repetition sounded dangerous to Vanessa.
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