Chapter 2 - THE LEDGERS OF CROSS ATLANTIC
The heavy oak doors of the vestry slammed shut behind us, cutting off the rising tide of gossip from the two hundred bewildered guests outside. Adrian pounded on the wooden panels, shouting my name, but Nathaniel ignored him completely, walking calmly toward the private exit that led directly to his armored Maybach.
“Let me out of here!” Adrian yelled, rattling the brass handle. “Evelyn, you’re making a massive mistake! We can talk about this!”
I didn’t even look back. My father’s death six months ago had left me as the primary shareholder of our family estate, but Adrian and my mother had spent the last year convincing me to sign over my voting rights to a corporate restructuring firm. A firm I now knew was owned by a shell company linked to Adrian.
Nathaniel held the car door open for me, his expression unreadable as the cool afternoon air hit us. “You handled that with remarkable precision, Evelyn. Most people would have thrown a vase.”
I slid into the plush leather interior, smoothing the skirt of my expensive, ruined wedding dress. “Throwing things wastes energy. I want every single asset back, Nathaniel. Including the shares Adrian managed to siphon away.”
He climbed in beside me, signaling his driver to pull away from the curb before the paparazzi could swarm the side entrance. “Those shares were transferred under a fraudulent proxy signature. Your father’s legal team flagged an irregularity three weeks ago, but we didn’t have definitive proof until today.”
I turned sharply to face him, the shock rippling through my chest. “You knew about Adrian before this?”
“I suspected,” Nathaniel corrected smoothly, resting his arm along the back of the seat. “Your father trusted me to protect this family’s legacy, which includes protecting you from opportunists. Adrian thought he was clever, routing capital through offshore accounts in the Cayman Islands.”
“How long have you been tracking him?” I asked, my mind racing as pieces of the puzzle clicked violently into place.
“Since your father’s funeral,” Nathaniel replied evenly. “Adrian started liquidating secondary properties almost immediately. He assumed you were too grief-stricken to notice the missing decimal points in the quarterly audits.”
I stared out the tinted window as the city skyline blurred past. Every family dinner, every sweet word Adrian had whispered about merging our lives and our accounts, had been a calculated performance designed to strip me of my inheritance.
“My mother was in on it,” I whispered, the bitter realization finally settling deep into my bones. “She kept pushing me to sign the power of attorney over to Adrian so ‘I wouldn’t have to worry about business stress.’”
“Your mother wanted financial security for Vanessa and her unborn child,” Nathaniel said quietly, his voice dropping an octave. “Greed makes people blind to long-term consequences. They thought they could ease you out quietly after the wedding.”
“Well, the wedding is canceled,” I said, turning back to meet his steady gaze. “What’s our first move?”
Nathaniel reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a sleek encrypted tablet, unlocking it with his thumbprint before handing it to me. “We freeze every corporate account tied to Adrian’s shell company before the markets open on Monday. Then, we audit the trust fund your mother manages.”
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I looked down at the screen, staring at the intricate web of financial transactions that spelled out my family's betrayal. A cold, determined fire burned in my chest.
“Do it,” I said softly. “Let’s burn their entire empire to the ground.”
