Chapter 5 - Cracks in the Facade
The backlash was swift, brutal, and public.
By noon the following day, the financial headlines were screaming:
**ELLISON ENTERPRISES ACCUSED OF MULTI-MILLION-DOLLAR DESIGN THEFT.**
**SOLIS WATERFRONT PROJECT HALTED BY FEDERAL INJUNCTION.**
**GRAHAM ELLISON’S ARCHITECTURAL GENIUS CALLED INTO QUESTION BY EX-WIFE.**
Stock in Ellison Enterprises plummeted fourteen percent in pre-market trading. The city council called an emergency oversight hearing, demanding Graham produce the raw CAD working files to prove ownership of the Solis Center designs. He couldn't, of course. Because those raw files sat on an encrypted, biometric hard drive resting inside Julian Sterling’s office safe.
I spent the afternoon at my drafting desk in my new studio space, which Julian had secured for me in the historic warehouse district. The high ceilings, exposed brick, and massive skylights flooded the room with natural, clear light. For the first time in over a decade, I was designing without Graham hovering over my shoulder, altering my curves into rigid, soulless lines to save on construction costs.
My phone rang. It was an unlisted number.
I pressed speakerphone. "Hensley Studio."
"Claire."
Graham’s voice sounded ragged, stripped of the suave arrogance he had displayed at the gala. Heavy traffic roared in the background; he was likely sitting in his car outside my building.
"What do you want, Graham?"
"We need to talk. In private. Without Sterling standing there like a guard dog."
"Mr. Sterling is my attorney. Anything you have to say can be put in a formal settlement offer."
"Damn it, Claire, stop playing games!" he snapped, his temper flaring through the speaker. "You are destroying my life! Do you know what the board said to me this morning? They are threatening to strip my CEO status if this injunction isn't lifted by Friday! You know that project belongs to our marriage! We built that together!"
"No, Graham," I said evenly, leaning back in my drafting chair and resting my hand lightly over my abdomen. "I built it. You signed your name to it. You took the awards. You took the speeches. You took the glory. You called me barren, you called me useless, and then you threw my suitcase onto the porch so you could play house with Brielle Stanton."
A heavy silence hung on the line. I could hear Graham’s ragged breathing.
"Brielle is pregnant, Claire," Graham said suddenly, his voice dropping into a desperate, vindictive whisper.
My heart gave a tiny, involuntary lurch, but I kept my face utterly still. "What did you say?"
"Brielle took a test this morning," he said, and I could hear the twisted, pathetic satisfaction creeping back into his tone. "It was positive. I am going to be a father. Everything you failed to give me for eleven years, she gave me in two months. So go ahead, sue me for the building. Take the money. I don't care. In eight months, I will have the son I always wanted, and you will still be a lonely, bitter woman in an empty apartment."
A cold, dark wave washed through me, followed instantly by a clarity so absolute it felt like ice water in my veins.
Brielle was pregnant? Two months after Graham started his affair?
"Is that so, Graham?" I asked quietly. "Then congratulations. You got exactly what you wanted."
"Drop the lawsuit, Claire," he pleaded, his voice shifting instantly from cruel to wheedling. "Drop the copyright suit, and I will give you five million dollars from the private accounts. Diane will sign off on it. We can close this chapter cleanly. Let me have my family."
"I’ll see you in court on Monday, Graham," I said, and ended the call.
Five minutes later, the door to my studio clicked open. Julian walked in, carrying two iced coffees—one decaf for me—and a thick manila folder under his arm. He noticed my pale expression immediately.
"What happened?" Julian asked, setting the coffees on the drafting table.
"Graham just called me," I said, staring at the blueprints. "He claims Brielle is pregnant."
Julian didn't look surprised. He casually untied the ribbon around the manila folder he had brought with him.
"She might be claiming she's pregnant, Claire," Julian said smoothly, sliding a series of private investigator photographs across my desk. "The question is: whose child is it?"
I leaned forward, looking down at the surveillance photos.
They showed Brielle Stanton entering an upscale hotel in Midtown three days ago, her arm linked with a handsome, dark-haired man who was decidedly not Graham Ellison. The following photos showed them dining intimately in a rooftop cabana, his hand resting on the small of her back.
"Who is that?" I asked.
"Carter Cross," Julian answered, his eyes gleaming with lethal amusement. "The principal heir to Cross Logistics. And Brielle’s former fiancé, whom she supposedly broke up with six months ago to pursue Graham."
Julian tapped the date stamp on the photograph.
"My investigator pulled Brielle’s private medical pharmacy records under an emergency discovery subpoena for the Stanton asset-freeze motion. Brielle didn't visit an OB-GYN this morning. She visited a private fertility concierge clinic in the Hamptons three weeks ago to confirm an eight-week gestation."
I froze, doing the mental math in an instant.
"Eight weeks?" I gasped. "Eight weeks ago, Graham was in Tokyo on a two-week architectural summit for the Solis Center."
"Precisely," Julian whispered. "Graham was across the Pacific Ocean when that baby was conceived. Marcus Stanton’s logistics company is ninety million dollars in debt to offshore lenders. Brielle didn't seduce Graham because she loved him, Claire. She seduced him because the Ellison family trust was the only life raft big enough to save her family from bankruptcy. She needed Graham to claim the child so the Stanton debts would be rolled into the Ellison trust."
I covered my mouth, a wild, incredulous laugh escaping my throat.
Graham had thrown away his wife, poisoned her body, and destroyed his marriage for an heir—only to be handed another man’s child by a desperate social climber who was playing him for every cent he owned.
"He thinks he won," I murmured, shaking my head. "He actually thinks he won."
"We let him think that for just a little longer," Julian said, his voice dropping into a low, intimate register as he stepped closer to my chair. He looked down at me, his gaze softening in a way he rarely permitted anyone to see. "How are you feeling today? Any nausea?"
"A little," I admitted, looking up at him. "Dr. Reed said the twin hormone levels are peaking this week. But they're healthy. I heard the heartbeats again yesterday."
Julian reached out, his fingers hesitating for a fraction of a second before gently brushing a stray lock of hair behind my ear. The warmth of his touch sent a pleasant, grounding shock through my tired body.
"Take care of yourself, Claire," Julian said softly. "Let me handle the wolves. You just focus on bringing those two babies into the world. When this is over, they will inherit an empire that you built with your own hands."
"Thank you, Julian," I said, meaning it with every fiber of my being.
May you like
"Don't thank me yet," he smiled, stepping back toward the door, his eyes turning back to cold flint. "Tomorrow morning, Dr. Robert Vance is scheduled for his preliminary deposition. And I don't think the good doctor handles pressure very well."
***
