Chapter 9 - The Confrontation at Vance's Tower
Betrayal from a stranger is an insult; betrayal from family is a wound; but betrayal from a trusted partner is poison.
"Marcus Kelly was drowning in sports gambling debt," Harrison Burke reported two hours later, after pulling the employee’s financial records. "Apex Horizon bought his debts two months ago. They owned him completely. He was the one who leaked the internal building codes to your father, and he was the one who verified your signature on the forged paperwork."
Nathaniel paced across the living room, his jaw set in cold fury. "We don't wait until Monday. We take the fight directly to Marcus Vance tonight before he realizes Marianne failed."
At eleven o'clock that night, our convoy pulled up outside the monolithic glass skyscraper of Apex Horizon Holdings in the financial district.
With Eleanor Sterling’s influence and a federal emergency subpoena secured by Harrison Burke through the state attorney general, we didn't knock. We walked through the front doors accompanied by four state investigators and two uniformed police captains.
The private penthouse elevators carried Nathaniel, Harrison, Eleanor, and me straight to the sixty-second floor.
The elevator doors opened directly into Marcus Vance’s private office.
Vance sat behind an immense marble desk, a tumbler of single-malt whiskey in his hand. He was in his mid-fifties, with silver-streaked hair and cold, calculating gray eyes that didn't even flinch when the armed officers fanned out into his room.
"Eleanor Sterling," Vance said smoothly, taking a slow sip of his drink. "I didn't expect a social call at midnight. And Miss Vanessa Cole. You certainly inherited none of your father’s cowardice."
"Cut the pleasantries, Marcus," Eleanor said, walking forward with the majesty of a queen surveying an insect. "Your little game is over. Marianne Cole is in custody. Marcus Kelly has just been arrested at his residence and is currently singing like a canary to the district attorney. We have the digital logs linking your offshore shell companies directly to the forged liens."
Vance smiled faintly, setting down his glass.
"Did you really think this was about four hundred thousand dollars, Eleanor?" Vance leaned forward, his gaze locking onto mine. "Your father was an idiot, Miss Cole. He begged me for money to save his bankrupt warehouse. I didn't care about his warehouse. I cared about the fact that your firm holds the structural keys to the Sterling Harbor deep-water pier."
"Which you will never touch," Nathaniel snapped, stepping in front of me protectively.
"I don't need to touch them anymore," Vance said, his smile turning cruel. "Because while you were busy dealing with your pathetic mother in your apartment hallway, your darling sister Bailey was sitting in my secondary office downtown."
May you like
I froze. "What did Bailey do?"
"Bailey wanted her fiancé back," Vance said softly. "And she was willing to sign whatever Gerald couldn't."
