Chapter 27 - The Debt Collector's Terms
The carriage house felt instantly smaller, trapped between the gaping abyss of Donald Sterling’s secret vault and the armed men framing the rain-swept doorway. The smell of wet earth and cigar smoke mingled under the timber rafters.
Mark stepped immediately in front of me, his hand slipping beneath his jacket to grip the handle of the hammer drill, his jaw set like granite. "You're trespassing on private land, Vanessa. Turn those trucks around before I call the state troopers."
The man beside Vanessa, Vance, gave a soft, dry chuckle that ended in a cough. He gestured slightly with his gloved hand, and one of his associates stepped forward, revealing a holstered pistol beneath his open oilskin coat.
"The state troopers won't be coming out here today, young man," Vance said in a cultured, raspy voice. "The county dispatch received a call twenty minutes ago reporting a downed power line across Route 9. Tree fell right across both lanes. Terrible inconvenience. We have approximately forty-five minutes before anyone clears it."
Vance stepped under the shelter of the carriage house roof, shaking drops of rain from his umbrella. His eyes swept across the room, completely ignoring Mark and me, before locking onto Julianne with a chilling familiarity.
"Julianne," Vance said, nodding slightly. "I see you didn't stay in Montreal. You always were faster than your brother Richard. But running up my tabs in Geneva wasn't very polite."
Julianne stood her ground, her chin raised, though the knuckles of her gloved hands were white against her sides. "You don't hold the deeds, Vance. Donald set this trust under Swiss sovereign law before the Chicago syndicate even existed. The paper notes Richard signed were uncollateralized personal loans. You have zero legal claim to this bedrock."
"Legal claim?" Vanessa scoffed, taking a jerky step forward. Her eyes were bloodshot, her designer coat splattered with ditch water. "You think the law matters anymore, Julianne? Dad is dying in a prison hospital right now because Clara wouldn't give us the wedding money! We lost everything! The mansion in town is locked by the sheriff! My car was repossessed out of the salon parking lot! If Clara had just signed over the checks like a good daughter, none of this would have happened!"
"You really believe that, don't you?" I said, stepping past Mark’s shoulder so Vanessa had to look directly at me. "You honestly believe Richard’s thirty years of fraud and gambling were caused by sixty thousand dollars from my wedding guests? Look at yourself, Vanessa. You brought armed criminals to the family farm to steal what Donald hid from Richard. You're not a victim. You're Richard’s pathetic apprentice."
Vanessa’s face contorted into a mask of pure fury. "Shut up! You always thought you were better than me! Just because Donald gave you his stupid pocket watch when you were six! Just because Mom loved your garden more than my pageants! Mr. Vance has the power of attorney Dad signed before his stroke this morning! He owns Donald’s name now!"
"Your father had no authority to sign power of attorney over Donald’s sovereign trust," Julianne said coldly. "He never owned it. Donald’s will specifically bypassed Richard entirely."
Vance exhaled a slow stream of smoke into the damp barn air. "The legalities can be settled by my attorneys over the next five years, ladies. But paper battles are expensive. I prefer practical solutions. Down in that cellar is the original registry folio containing bearer certificates and thirty-two thousand ounces of unrefined gold bullion Donald moved out of the Detroit mint in 1974."
He pointed his cigar at the open staircase.
"Here is the bargain. You two women go down there. You provide your biometric signatures to unlock the inner safe. You hand over the bearer certificates to me to settle Richard’s twelve-million-dollar ledger. In exchange, I leave the land deeds to Clara. You keep your dirt and your little barn, Clara. I take the liquid assets Donald stole from my predecessors forty years ago. Everyone walks away whole."
"And if we refuse?" Mark demanded, his voice dangerously low.
Vance smiled, a cold, predatory slit of teeth. "Then my men seal that limestone door with hydraulic expansion foam, back those two trucks over the entrance, and let the rain wash away the evidence. By the time anyone finds you, this estate will have been sold at county tax auction to a shell corporation I control."
I looked at Julianne. Her eyes were fixed on the opening in the floor, calculating, weighing the odds. Then she met my gaze. A nearly imperceptible nod passed between us. Donald Sterling was a ruthless bastard, but he had prepared for thieves.
"Fine," I said, looking Vance dead in the eye. "Mark stays up here. Julianne and I go down to open the safe."
"Clara, no," Mark whispered fiercely, catching my arm.
May you like
"It’s okay," I said softly, squeezing his hand. "Remember what Donald wrote on the inside of the pocket watch, Mark. *The foundation only breaks from within.*"
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