Chapter 6 - The Council of the Trust
While the drama on the Amalfi Coast was imploding into international headlines, eight thousand miles away in downtown Chicago, the thirty-eighth floor of the Vance Tower on Wacker Drive was bathed in the warm, golden light of a late October afternoon.
The private executive conference room looked out over the Chicago River, where commercial barges and architectural tour boats cut through the deep green water beneath an endless autumn sky.
I sat at the massive black walnut conference table, dressed in an impeccably tailored navy wool skirt suit, my dark hair swept up into an elegant, unpretentious chignon, my hands resting calmly over a leather-bound folio stamped with the gold seal of the State of Illinois.
Beside me sat Preston.
He had traded his worn Red Wing work boots and his faded flannel shirt for a bespoke charcoal three-piece suit, a crisp white dress shirt open at the throat without a tie, his dark hair combed back with ruthless precision. He looked magnificent: tall, broad-shouldered, radiating an ancient, sovereign authority that filled the vast room like an incoming tide.
Sitting across from us were United States Attorney Sarah Lin and Marcus Vance, along with two forensic accounting directors from the Federal Trade Commission.
"The restitution audit is certified, Mrs. Vance," Sarah Lin said, sliding a sixty-page legal docket across the table toward me with a respectful nod.
"The federal court granted our emergency civil forfeiture petition at eleven o'clock this morning.
Every single euro wired to the Italian event coordinators has been repatriated through the international banking clearinghouse in Frankfurt.
The funds—one hundred and fourteen thousand, eight hundred and twenty dollars, plus eighteen thousand in statutory civil penalties—have been deposited directly into your personal account at JPMorgan Private Bank."
I looked down at the certified bank draft resting on top of the docket:
JPMORGAN CHASE BANK, N.A. – PRIVATE WEALTH DIVISION
OFFICIAL CASHIER'S DRAFT #088412-99
PAY TO THE ORDER OF: KENDRA BENNETT-VANCE
AMOUNT: $132,820.00
MEMO: RESTITUTION OF ARTHUR BENNETT TESTAMENTARY TRUST
My throat tightened. A single tear welled along my lash, slipping down my cheek before I could catch it with my finger.
It wasn't about the money.
With Preston’s sixty million dollars in treasury assets and our private estate overlooking the lake in Lake Forest, one hundred and thirty-two thousand dollars was a drop in the ocean.
It was about the truth.
It was about the grandfather who had slipped twenty-dollar bills into my coat pocket when I was sixteen, whispering that I was the only person in the family who knew the value of an honest hour’s labor. It was about the state university dorm room where I had studied by the light of a desk lamp while smelling of diner grease, believing that my parents’ coldness was somehow my own fault.
Preston reached out under the table, taking my left hand in his large, warm, calloused palm, his fingers interlacing with mine with an unshakeable, permanent strength that made my heart feel completely whole.
"And Gordon Bennett, Sarah?" Preston asked, turning his gray gaze toward the federal prosecutor.
"Gordon Bennett was formally arraigned two hours ago in the Dirksen Federal Building," Sarah Lin replied, closing her briefcase. "He entered a plea of not guilty to three counts of wire fraud, two counts of bank fraud, and one count of aggravated conversion of trust assets. The magistrate set bail at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, secured by ten percent cash."
"Did Beverly post the bail?" I asked softly.
Sarah Lin smiled—a thin, unsparing curve of her lips that carried the clinical detachment of a seasoned prosecutor.
"Beverly attempted to use Charlene’s convertible as collateral, Mrs. Vance. But when the county clerk ran the vehicle identification number, they discovered that Gordon had already pledged the title to a private title loan company in Waukegan three months ago to pay for Charlene’s engagement party catering. The vehicle was repossessed by the sheriff twenty minutes after Gordon was remanded to custody."
Sarah stood up, smoothing her suit jacket.
"Gordon Bennett will be spending the next six months in the Metropolitan Correctional Center awaiting trial.
May you like
And Beverly and Charlene...
are currently residing at the Budget Motel in Mundelein."
