Chapter 4 - The House of Cards
Within forty-eight hours, I checked myself out of the hospital against Daniel’s wishes. I refused to go back to the Cole estate. Instead, Rachel drove me to a secured apartment downtown—a place Daniel didn't know existed, leased under one of my old alias LLCs from my investigation days.
My body was a map of pain, but my mind was clearer than it had been in years. The fog of gaslighting had evaporated the moment Vivian poured that oil.
“He tried to access your personal bank accounts yesterday,” Rachel said, handing me a laptop as I sat on the couch, propped up by pillows. “But I already transferred your pre-marital assets into a blind trust. He’s locked out.”
“What about the kitchen footage?” I asked, my voice steady.
Rachel smiled, a dangerous, sharp expression. “It’s beautiful, Clara. The camera captured everything. Vivian’s face when she lifted the pot. The deliberate angle of the pour. The way Daniel stepped over you. It’s not just assault; it’s attempted murder with extreme indifference to human life.”
I opened the laptop. On the screen was the layout of Cole & Sons Logistics.
“We can’t just go to the police with the assault,” I said, looking at the numbers. “If we do, Daniel will use his family's money and high-priced lawyers to drag this out. He’ll paint me as a bitter, unstable wife who mutilated herself for a payday. Vivian will play the frail old grandmother. We need to strike them where they are weakest. Their money.”
“The logistics company is a hollow shell,” Rachel agreed, pointing to the screen. “I traced the offshore accounts. Daniel has been funneling the employee pension funds into a shell company in the Cayman Islands called Aegis Holdings. But here’s the kicker: Vivian is the registered agent for Aegis.”
I stared at the name. Vivian.
“She’s the mastermind,” I murmured. “Daniel is just the muscle and the face. He does the dirty work, but she holds the purse strings. That’s why she was so comfortable dumping that oil. She believed she owned the police, the lawyers, and me.”
“So, what’s the play?” Rachel asked.
I looked down at my bandaged arm. The pain was a constant, throbbing reminder of what they had taken from me. My career. My self-respect. My safety.
“We don’t file the police report yet,” I said, my eyes narrowing. “We let them think they’re winning. We let Daniel think I’m hiding in fear. In the meantime, we initiate a forensic audit of Cole & Sons on behalf of the minority shareholders—the very people whose pensions he stole. I still have connections at the SEC.”
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“And Vivian?”
“Vivian loves her reputation more than her life,” I said. “We’re going to dismantle her social standing, dollar by dollar, lie by lie, until she has nothing left but the smell of burnt oil.”
