Chapter 5 - THE CRUMBLING FAÇADE
-5-
By Tuesday afternoon, the illusion of Dominic Vance’s charmed life had begun to fracture in public view.
Without the capital backing of Brooks Global, Vance Technologies missed its scheduled payroll cycle. Employees who arrived at the sleek downtown office expecting direct deposits found their accounts empty. Within hours, murmurs turned into open mutiny. Key software engineers packed up their desks and walked out, taking critical proprietary codebases with them to rival firms that had been circling like vultures.
Worse still, the financial news outlets—tipped off by discrete whispers from our corporate PR department—began publishing investigative pieces questioning the sudden liquidity crisis at Vance Technologies. Headlines flashed across financial terminals: “Vance Technologies Facing Imminent Collapse Amid Allegations of Mismanaged Venture Capital.”
I watched the financial news broadcast from the comfort of the Brooks manor library, sipping chamomile tea while Leo slept soundly in his crib nearby. On the screen, a reporter stood outside the locked glass doors of Dominic’s corporate office, interviewing disgruntled former employees who complained about bounced paychecks and erratic management.
Then, the camera cut to footage of Dominic exiting a downtown coffee shop earlier that morning. He looked terrible. His hair was unbrushed, his designer suit wrinkled as though he had slept in it, and his face pale with panic. When a reporter shoved a microphone in his face and asked about the sudden collapse of his funding, Dominic lost his temper, aggressively swatting the microphone away before diving into a waiting taxi.
It was a public relations disaster of epic proportions.
My phone buzzed. It was an incoming call from an unknown number. I let it ring twice before sliding my thumb across the screen to answer.
"Audrey!" Dominic’s voice screamed through the speaker, breathless, frantic, and trembling with barely contained rage and terror. "What the hell did you do? What is happening?"
I kept my voice completely calm, detached, and chillingly polite. "Hello, Dominic. I believe you told me to stop being dramatic and stay out of your way. Have you forgotten already?"
"Stop playing games!" he yelled, his voice cracking. "My investors are pulling out! The board is holding an emergency vote to oust me as CEO! My bank accounts are frozen, my office is locked, and when I went back to our penthouse, the building management told me my lease was terminated for breach of contract! Did you do this? Did your father do this?"
"My father and I are simply letting you experience the consequences of your own choices," I replied evenly. "After all, as you so eloquently reminded me outside the hospital, people should pull their own weight. You shouldn't find independence so difficult, Dominic. My sister—or rather, your sister—was walking around three days after giving birth. Surely a brilliant entrepreneur like you can survive a little adversity."
There was a long, stunned silence on the line. The mockery of his own words landing back on him seemed to strike him harder than the financial ruin itself.
"Audrey... please," his voice dropped into a desperate, pleading whine. "Listen to me. We have a newborn son. We're a family. Whatever mistakes I made... I was stressed about the company, I wasn't thinking straight! Come back home. Let's talk this out like adults. Please... I need you."
"We are done talking, Dominic," I said quietly. "Marcus has sent the formal divorce papers to your legal counsel. Sign them, surrender the remaining corporate assets, and prepare for your deposition on Thursday. Anything else you have to say can be spoken to a judge."
"Audrey, wait! Don't—"
I hung up the phone and blocked the number instantly.
I set the phone down on the mahogany table and looked out the window. The rain had cleared, leaving the lush gardens sparkling under the bright afternoon sun. For two years, I had walked on eggshells in my own marriage, terrified of breaking the fragile glass house Dominic had built around us. Now, looking back, I realized how absurd it had been. He was nothing more than a fragile ego built on borrowed money and stolen trust.
Later that afternoon, my father walked into the library, holding a fresh dossier stamped with the Brooks Global crest.
"I heard you had a pleasant chat with your soon-to-be-ex-husband," my father said, a faint smile playing on his lips as he took a seat across from me.
"He's panicking," I said simply. "He tried the usual manipulation tactics, then resorted to begging. It's pathetic."
"Desperation brings out the true nature of small men," my father remarked, sliding the dossier across the table. "Speaking of true nature, look at what our investigators pulled from the Cayman offshore accounts this morning. It turns out Dominic wasn't just funding a secret apartment for Chloe Mendez. He was also systematically transferring company funds to his mother's personal accounts to buy real estate in Florida under Victoria's name."
I opened the folder, scanning the certified bank records. Victoria Vance—the woman who had spent two years looking down her nose at me, criticizing my background, and treating me like an uninvited guest in her son's life—was knee-deep in her son's corporate embezzlement scheme.
"Does Victoria know that her retirement nest egg is tied directly to federal felony wire fraud?" I asked, looking up at my father.
"Not yet," my father replied smoothly. "But I imagine she's about to find out. Marcus has scheduled a joint deposition for Dominic, Victoria, and Natalie for Thursday morning. They're all listed as co-conspirators in the asset misappropriation suit."
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A slow, cold smile spread across my face. Victoria, Arthur, and Natalie were about to experience a very public, very painful reality check. They had spent a lifetime sneering at people they deemed inferior, riding the coattails of a fake fortune funded by my family's grace.
On Thursday, the house of cards wasn't just going to fall. It was going to be completely demolished.
