Chapter 8 - The Net Tightens
"Hands on your head! Do it now!"
Three tactical officers swarmed the slipway, assault rifles raised, their boots thudding heavily against the concrete. In the blink of an eye, Arthur Sterling slipped over the edge of the pier, dropping silently into a waiting black motorboat idling in the dark river below, which sped off into the night before the agents could fire a shot.
"Stay where you are, ma'am! Turn around slowly!"
I raised my hands, my heart hammering against my ribs, though my face remained a mask of icy composure. I didn't resist as an agent spun me around, snapping cold steel handcuffs around my wrists.
"Vivienne Ashford, you are being detained for questioning regarding corporate embezzlement, conspiracy, and financial fraud tied to Apex Holdings," the lead agent recited formally, guiding me toward a waiting SUV.
"You're making a massive mistake," I said, my voice steady and commanding even as I was pushed into the back of the cruiser. "The man you should be chasing just fled down the East River, and the real architect of this fraud is Julian Vance."
The agent didn't answer. He slammed the door shut, locking me inside the dark, sterile compartment.
Forty-five minutes later, I sat across a stainless-steel interrogation table in a subterranean federal holding facility downtown. The room smelled of stale coffee and bureaucratic despair. The overhead fluorescent bulb hummed with an irritating, high-pitched frequency.
The door opened, and Marcus Vance walked in—not as a defense attorney, but flanked by two federal prosecutors. He looked nervous, clutching a thick manila folder to his chest, but there was a flicker of triumphant malice in his eyes.
"Well, Vivienne," Marcus said, taking a seat opposite me. He slid a document across the metal table. "It seems the tables have turned rather quickly. The federal prosecutor's office has just frozen all Ashford family trusts, personal accounts, and corporate assets pending investigation."
I looked down at the injunction papers, then slowly raised my gaze to meet Marcus's eyes. I didn't flinch. I didn't break.
"You think freezing my accounts stops me, Marcus?" I asked quietly.
"It stops you from fighting back," Marcus replied smoothly, leaning forward. "Julian controls the board now. Grant is facing twenty years for bigamy and fraud. And you... well, you signed joint tax returns for the past three years. Legally, you are considered a co-conspirator in the Apex Holdings embezzlement scheme."
"Co-conspirator?" I let out a low, humorless laugh. "Marcus, your uncle Julian built a multi-million-dollar shell corporation using his own granddaughter as a sleeper agent to destroy my husband. Do you really think I didn't audit every single account associated with the Ashford family trusts before I married Grant?"
Marcus’s triumphant smirk faltered for a fraction of a second. "What are you talking about?"
"My father wasn't just a wealthy industrialist, Marcus. He was a federal banking regulator," I said, leaning back against the metal chair, the handcuffs clinking softly. "Before I signed a single marriage document with Grant, I had a private contingency trust established under international law—completely shielded from Ashford Hotels, completely immune to board buyouts, and entirely under my sole execution."
Marcus stared at me, his face turning pale. "That's impossible. We audited your personal holdings months ago."
"You audited what I wanted you to see," I corrected him, smiling faintly. "And speaking of audits... did you know that Arthur Sterling just gave me the exact coordinates of where Piper’s newborn baby was smuggled?"
Marcus’s jaw dropped. Before he could utter a single word, the interrogation room door flew open, slamming violently against the drywall.
A breathless federal marshal rushed in, ignoring Marcus entirely, and slammed a tablet down on the table in front of us.
May you like
"Sir, we just intercepted an emergency transmission from Saint Aurelia Women’s Pavilion," the marshal gasped. "Piper Vance broke out of police custody twenty minutes ago... and she’s heading straight for your private estate."
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