Evelyn: You struck me! A son struck his own mother in front of law enforcement!
David: You padlocked a heavily pregnant woman inside a tin box in ninety-five-degree heat!
Evelyn: I was keeping her safe from intruders while the alarm system was being serviced!
Claire: That's a lie, David! She grabbed my wrist by the patio and forced me inside at knifepoint!
David: Did you pull a knife on my pregnant wife, Mother?
Evelyn: It was a kitchen paring knife! I was slicing lemons for iced tea on the porch!
Officer Miller: That is an eight-inch carving blade on the floor, Mrs. Sterling. Not a paring knife.
Evelyn: Mind your own business, patrolman! This is private family business inside our gates!
David: This stopped being family business the second you tried to suffocate my unborn child!
David knelt back down on the gravel, gently wiping the damp hair away from Claire's forehead.
David: Claire, baby, look at me. Are you having any cramps? Are the contractions coming?
Claire: My lower back is throbbing, David... The heat inside that shed was so thick I couldn't pull air into my lungs.
David: Officer Miller, call the emergency pediatric ambulance to the estate right now.
Officer Miller: Dispatch, this is Unit Four. I need priority medical transport to twelve-hundred Sterling Ridge Road immediately.
Evelyn: You don't need an ambulance! She is putting on a pathetic performance to turn you against me!
David: Shut your mouth, Evelyn! Just shut your mouth before I lose whatever sanity I have left!
Evelyn: Don't you dare use that disrespectful tone with the woman who gave you life!
David: You gave me life, and then you spent the last thirty years trying to control every breath I take.
Evelyn: I protected your father's fortune from gold-digging tramps!
David: Claire has never asked for a single cent of this family's money!
Evelyn: She didn't have to ask! She trapped you with a pregnancy so she could claim half the estate!
Claire: We were trying to build a peaceful family, Evelyn! We offered to buy our own house in Plano!
Evelyn: You will never take my son away to a common suburban tract house!
David: We offered to move because we couldn't stand breathing the same toxic air as you!
Evelyn: You belong in this mansion! You are a Sterling! Your father built this empire for us!
David: My father built this company with clean hands, Mother. You spent twenty years bleeding it dry.
Evelyn stiffened, her burgundy velvet gown bunching against the handcuffs behind her back.
Evelyn: What did you say about your father's business?
David: You heard me perfectly. Why do you think I drove down to the county probate archive this morning?
Evelyn: You were supposed to be at the quarterly commercial logistics review in Fort Worth!
David: I sent my chief financial auditor to Fort Worth while I went to look inside the sealed court vaults.
Evelyn's breath hitched, her eyes flickering with sudden, uneasy panic.
Evelyn: Those court vaults require an executive judicial order to unseal!
David: Judge Harrison granted the executive unsealing order at seven o'clock this morning.
Evelyn: Harrison had no right! That was private marital documentation between your father and me!
David: It stopped being private when you tried to transfer sixty million dollars to an offshore account in the Caymans.
Claire clutched David's forearm, her breathing ragged as a fresh wave of pain tightened her stomach.
Claire: David... It hurts... The pressure is building up...
David: Hang on, my love. Breathe with me. In and out. The paramedics are clearing the security gates right now.
A distant siren began to wail down the long oak-lined avenue, growing louder by the second.
David stood up, turning his stone-cold gaze back onto the trembling woman in velvet.
David: Your ten minutes in this house are up, Evelyn. You will never set foot across this threshold again.