“Do you have any idea what you’re doing? You froze the corporate accounts! You sold your twenty-eight percent equity to a shell company! Name your price! The house, the cars, ten million in dividends—just lift the freeze! We can negotiate!”
“Do you still not comprehend the situation?” I asked softly. “This is not a negotiation.”
“You want to destroy the Vance Group? Three years of your own blood and sweat?”
“It is my blood and sweat,” I corrected, my tone dropping to an absolute, glacial zero. “You utilized the fortress I built to finance your mistress and her bastard. Over three point five million dollars embezzled from the corporate reserve. I submitted the ledgers to the SEC this morning. They are already auditing your building.”
The line fell into a suffocating silence. I could hear his ragged breathing.
“When did you investigate this?” he stammered. “You knew… you knew all along?”
“I gave you nine months,” I whispered, the exhaustion finally bleeding into my voice. “My entire pregnancy, I waited for you to exhibit a shred of humanity. Instead, you brought her into my delivery room. So, there is nothing to negotiate. Sign the papers, Julian. If you don’t, the court will simply rule in my favor anyway.”
“Do you hate me that much?” he choked out.
“It isn’t hate,” I replied truthfully. “It’s just not worth it anymore.”
I disconnected the call.
He didn’t know the worst of it yet. He thought this was merely a scorned woman’s financial revenge. He didn’t realize that my forensic accountants had dug deeper than the domestic embezzlement. They had traced a separate 1.5 million dollar wire transfer from a Vance subsidiary into a Cayman Islands shell company named Sunrise Capital Limited.
I knew who owned Sunrise Capital. I knew who Mia Lawson really worked for. And I knew exactly what Julian was about to discover.
Khloe’s message arrived right on schedule: “Julian just forced Mia to agree to a DNA test for Leo. He’s panicking. He thinks he can save the narrative if the boy is his.”
I looked down at the encrypted file on my tablet. Let him try.
Chapter 4: The Ultimate Humiliation
Julian’s world didn’t end with a bang; it ended with a deafening silence inside a pediatric clinic.
Through Khloe’s network, I was informed that Mia never showed up for the DNA test. She feigned a crisis, stalling for time. But Julian didn’t need a new test. I had already provided him with one.
