Chapter 4 - THE SCRAMBLE
1210 wordsThe sun was setting, casting long, bloody orange shadows across the hardwood floors of the living room. Daniel had left forty minutes ago, carrying a single black duffel bag containing three suits and a pair of shoes. Deputy Miller had escorted him down the driveway while Patricia screamed threats from her Mercedes, promising that her high-powered legal team would "destroy" me by morning.I stood by the front window, watching the empty driveway. The silence in the house was almost deafening now. Up upstairs, Lily and Noah were eating the takeout pizza Mr. Meyers had kindly ordered for them.
Mr. Meyers sat at my kitchen table, spreadsheets and legal documents spread out before him like a war map. Beside him sat Chloe Vance, a sharp-eyed forensic accountant with tight brown hair and wire glasses, who had spent the last two hours plugging data into her laptop.
"He's panicking," Chloe said, without looking up from her screen. Her fingers flew across her keyboard with terrifying speed. "The moment Daniel stepped into his mother's car, someone attempted three separate wire transfers from Carter Consulting’s primary reserve account at First National."
I walked into the kitchen, pouring three glasses of ice water and setting them on the table. "Did they go through?"
"Not a chance," Chloe replied with a tight, ruthless smile. "Mr. Meyers had the account flagged at eight-thirty this morning. The system automatically rejected the transfers and flagged the IP address." She turned her screen toward me. "The attempt originated from an address registered to Vanessa Reed’s penthouse apartment downtown."
"They're desperate," Mr. Meyers said, taking a sip of water. "Daniel knows that once the courts open tomorrow morning, we will file for emergency injunctive relief. He’s trying to move whatever liquid cash he can touch before he gets served with the formal fraud suit."
I leaned against the counter, crossing my arms. "How much is in that primary account?"
"Four point five million," Chloe said calmly. "And here’s the interesting part, Emily. That four point five million isn't client money. It was wired into his account forty-eight hours ago from a private equity firm in Manhattan called Sterling & Cross."
I frowned. "Sterling & Cross? Daniel mentioned them last month. He said he was negotiating a merger."
"It wasn't a merger," Mr. Meyers said, pulling a red folder from his stack. "It was a buyout. Daniel was attempting to sell Carter Consulting—and all of its underlying assets, including the intellectual property and real estate holdings—to Sterling & Cross for forty million dollars."
My breath hitched in my throat. "Forty million?"
"Yes," Mr. Meyers said. "He was planning to take the forty million buyout, pocket twenty-four million under the table via offshore shell accounts, file for divorce, hand you a hundred thousand dollars in settlement money, and walk away with Vanessa Reed as a multi-millionaire."
I stared at the financial breakdown on the screen. The sheer scale of the betrayal was staggering. It wasn't just an affair; it wasn't just a sudden fallout in a failing marriage. Daniel had spent years calculating every step of my total destruction. He wanted to leave me penniless, disgraced, and broken, while he took the fruits of my aunt's wealth to fund a new life.
"He was five days away from closing the deal," Chloe added. "If your aunt Margaret hadn't passed away when she did, and if her instructions hadn't executed today... he would have pulled it off."
"Where is the money from Sterling & Cross right now?" I asked, my voice deadly quiet.
"The four point five million earnest money is currently frozen in the Carter Consulting vault account," Chloe said. "The remaining thirty-five million is sitting in an escrow account held by Sterling & Cross's legal counsel in New York, awaiting final closing signatures."
"Which he can no longer provide," Mr. Meyers said with a cold smile, "because he does not hold majority control of the company. You do."
Before I could process the weight of that statement, my phone on the counter began to buzz frantically. The screen lit up with an unlisted number.
I picked it up and swiped the screen. "Hello?"
"Emily."
It wasn't Daniel. It was Vanessa. Her voice was stripped of all the cool, smug arrogance she had displayed on my porch. She sounded breathless, frantic, and cornered.
"Vanessa," I said, keeping my tone completely level. "I believe you were instructed not to contact me."
"Listen to me, you stupid bitch," Vanessa hissed through the phone, her voice shaking with rage. "You think you're so smart? You think because you found some old papers you can destroy our lives? Daniel owes money! Do you hear me? He owes heavy people!"
I glanced at Mr. Meyers, who immediately leaned in, hitting the record button on his phone tablet.
"What are you talking about, Vanessa?" I asked calmly.
"That Sterling deal—it wasn't just a buyout!" Vanessa spat, her background noise echoing with the sound of packing tape being ripped. "Daniel took a high-interest bridge loan from private investors to cover the firm’s operating costs for the last two years! If that deal with Sterling & Cross doesn't close by Friday afternoon, those investors are going to seize everything! They don't care about your trust, Emily! They don't care about your lawyers! They will tear that company apart and come after you!"
"If Daniel took out fraudulent personal loans using company assets as collateral without board approval," I said smoothly, "that is his legal liability, not mine."
"You don't get it!" Vanessa screamed. "He signed the loan guarantees using your name! He forged your signature on the guarantor documents two years ago!"
The room went dead silent. Chloe paused her typing. Mr. Meyers’ eyes locked onto mine, his expression suddenly grave.
My heart hammered against my ribs, but I forced my voice to remain cold as ice. "He forged my signature?"
"Yes!" Vanessa laughed hysterically. "On a twelve million dollar debt guarantee! So go ahead, play the victorious victim! If Daniel goes down, he’s taking you down with him! You’ll be broke and sitting in a bankruptcy court before the month is over!"
"Vanessa," I said softly into the microphone.
"What?!" she snapped.
"Thank you for the recorded confession," I said, and hung up the phone.
I set the phone back on the counter. My hands were trembling slightly, but my mind was clearer than it had ever been in my life. I turned to Mr. Meyers.
"Can she be serious?" I asked. "Did he forge my name on a twelve million dollar personal guarantee?"
Mr. Meyers slowly sat up straight, his jaw tight. "If he did, it explains why he was so eager to serve you with divorce papers today. If you were divorced and bankrupted before the debt defaulted, the liability would have been dumped onto your personal credit while he absconded with the Sterling buyout funds."
"What do we do?" I asked.
May you like
Mr. Meyers opened his briefcase once more, pulling out a sleek black leather folder stamped with a gold crest.
"We don't wait for Friday," Mr. Meyers said, a dangerous glint in his eyes. "We fly to Manhattan tomorrow morning. It’s time you take your seat at Whitmore Tower."
