Thank you, I usually prefer to tiptoe towards issues and let the reader use their own imagination to delve deeper, if necessary. I find that often, giving just the hint of the subject matter is all that the brain needs to fill in the blanks. This allows the author to provide the structure of the home, but lets the reader choose which paintings to hang.
I didn't know how to end it at first, and then realized where I'd like to take it after reading it over several times. The daughter really was already stripped and laid bare before society. Not physically of course, but emotionally.
She was expected to live her life openly as the daughter of such a well-known, successful philanthropist. Her world waited for glimpses of her mother (and would later expect the same of her) because that is what is always demanded of those in the spotlight.
Strong parents will often thrust themselves into sacrificial situations for the well-being of their child(ren), and Cara realized standing before her mother's admirers, that she would continue in the same path.
Thankfully for her, her mother's diligence in planning for her financial future spared her the difficulty of the one type of "stripping", but she was willing to embrace the other type. Not just for the benefit of her future progeny, but for those in that room that would continue to need someone to fill the void left by her mother.