Vanessa Vale dragged her sister’s chair backward in front of two hundred wedding guests.

Vanessa did not stay locked in the guest cottage for long. When the county bank frozen her personal and commercial accounts, she marched into the administration building, her eyes bloodshot, her designer silk blouse rumpled.

“You froze my cards!” she screamed, slamming her palms onto Marin’s desk. Two junior accountants outside the glass partition flinched. “I couldn't even pay the valet crew from yesterday! Do you have any idea how humiliating this is?”

“You should be less concerned about the valet and more concerned about wire fraud,” Marin answered without looking up from her ledger.

Vanessa scoffed, though panic flickered in her throat. “You won't send your own sister to prison. Mom won't let you. Dad won't let you.”

“Dad signed the authorization to open a forensic audit this morning,” Marin said quietly, finally lifting her gaze. “Because when the forensic team pulled your transaction logs, they didn't just find Larkstone's money. They found thirty-two unauthorized transfers from Veil House’s seasonal worker pension fund.”

Vanessa’s face lost every trace of color. “That was a temporary transfer. I was going to replace it the moment the Larkstone deal cleared!”

“You gambled our workers' livelihoods on a luxury lifestyle and bad cryptocurrency investments,” Nolan said from the doorway. He looked at Vanessa not with anger, but with an absolute, chilling pity. “You used my architectural firm’s reputation as collateral to convince Larkstone that the project was shovel-ready.”

“Nolan, baby, please,” Vanessa pleaded, her voice cracking as she turned toward him. “I did it for us. We were going to build an empire. Larkstone promised us a twenty percent equity stake in the global resort chain!”