Chapter 6 - The Counter-Offensive-6
The taller police officer stepped forward, putting his hand flat over the CPS caseworker's manila folder, gently pushing it down.
"Ms. Jenkins," the officer said, his voice hard. "I think you need to call the duty magistrate back immediately and inform them that the petition was obtained through material fraud and perjury. We are not touching this child."
"Yes," Jenkins stammered, her hands shaking as she pulled out her official phone. "Yes, immediately. I... I apologize, Mr. Vance. We had no idea."
"Save your apology," I said, turning my back on them to focus entirely on my wife. "Just get out of my wife's room."
Within five minutes, the officers and the caseworker had exited the ICU ward, rushing to file an emergency suspension of the protective order and flag Marcus Reed’s legal filing for judicial review.
I sat on the edge of Clara’s bed, leaning down to kiss her cold forehead. She gave me a weak, tired smile, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes.
"You saved him, Julian," she whispered.
"No, baby," I said, my eyes burning with tears. "You saved us. You remembered the cameras."
"I was so scared," she choked out, her hand trembling in mine. "When she was standing over me in the kitchen... she told me you hated me. She said you only stayed with me because of the baby, and that you were planning to divorce me as soon as the birth was over."
A rage deeper and more terrible than anything I had ever felt settled into my bones. Eleanor hadn't just physically abused my wife; she had spent hours trying to poison Clara’s mind, breaking her spirit so completely that she wouldn't fight back when the legal papers arrived.
"Listen to me, Clara," I said, holding her face between my hands, looking straight into her eyes so there was zero doubt in her mind. "I love you. More than my own life. What that woman did to you is unforgivable. She is never touching our family again. I am going to tear down everything she has built."
My phone vibrated in my pocket. It was a text message from my cousin David.
David: "Julian, I just checked the corporate registry for Eleanor’s holding firm, Vance Properties LLC. She just scheduled an emergency board meeting for 9:00 AM tomorrow at her downtown office to execute the trust succession paperwork. She thinks she’s winning. She doesn't know you have the video."
I looked at the clock on the ICU wall. It was 3:45 a.m.
In five hours, my mother was planning to sit down in a glass boardroom surrounded by her accountants and lawyers to sign the documents that would secure her control over my father’s forty-million-dollar land trust.
I pulled up my contact list, selected a number I hadn't dialed in years—the direct line to the Special Investigations Unit of the State Attorney General’s Office—and hit call.
May you like
"Special Investigations, Agent Miller," a sharp voice answered on the second ring.
"Agent Miller," I said, my tone as cold and unyielding as granite. "My name is Julian Vance. I am calling to report a felony conspiracy involving medical abuse, perjury, and a multi-million-dollar trust fraud involving Vance Properties and Marcus Reed, Esq. And I have 4K video evidence to prove every single word."
