Chapter 4: The House of Cards
The following forty-eight hours were a blur of federal investigators, white-collar crime task forces, and the rapid, systematic dismantling of the Vance empire.
Julianna’s power evaporated the moment Marcus Sterling handed the evidence to the Attorney General. The socialites who had fawned over her at the mall were now deleting her number from their phones. The board of directors at Vance Shipping—many of whom had been complicit in the cover-up—were scrambling to cut deals, turning on their former leader to save their own skin.
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In the seclusion of a private legal suite, Julianna sat alone. The arrogance that had defined her was gone, replaced by a hollow, frantic fear. She wasn't just losing her fortune; she was facing a decade of prison time for fraud, conspiracy, and obstruction of justice.
She kept playing the scene in the mall over in her head. The doll. The grandmother. The look on Mia’s face. She had spent years convincing herself that she had won, that the past was buried deep enough that no one would ever think to dig. She had underestimated the very thing she had tried to erase: love. Love for a father, love for a grandmother, love for the truth.
