Chapter 3 - The Audit of Pain
The heavy oak doors of the main conservatory slammed shut, locking Evan and Vanessa inside the glass house surrounded by winter orchids. Two enforcers stood outside the doors like gargoyles.
Vanessa was kneeling on the floor now, sobbing hysterically. "Evan, I'm sorry! I was overwhelmed! You were gone for months, the kids were disobedient, they kept calling me 'that lady'... I lost my temper! It was just a slap!"
Evan walked over to a marble display table and set down a heavy leather folder he had kept hidden in the groundskeeper's shed. He opened it, revealing dozens of high-resolution photographs taken over the past eleven days.
He dropped them one by one onto the floor in front of her.
"Day three," Evan said, his voice flat. "Sophie dropped a fork at dinner. You made her eat her meal off the floor without utensils while you watched."
Vanessa flinched.
"Day six," Evan continued, dropping another photo. "Caleb woke up from a nightmare calling for his mother. You locked him in the wine cellar for two hours until he stopped screaming."
"He was being hysterical!" Vanessa shrieked.
"Day eight," Evan’s voice grew lower, colder, heavier. "You told Sophie that I was in London looking for a new family because she was too ugly and quiet to be my daughter. You told her that if she spoke to me when I returned, I would send her away to a boarding school in Europe and she would never see Caleb again."
Vanessa buried her face in her hands, shaking uncontrollably. "I was trying to make them respect you! They were soft, Evan! They were weak like their mother!"
CRASH.
Evan’s fist slammed through the reinforced glass display case beside her, shattering the thick pane into a thousand diamond shards. Vanessa screamed, curling into a ball on the floor.
Evan didn't even look at his bleeding knuckles. He leaned down until his face was inches from hers.
"Don't you ever," Evan growled, his voice a nightmare from the dark, "speak my wife's name with your filthy mouth."
He stood up, pulling a white handkerchief from his vest and casually wiping the blood from his hand.
"I didn't just record you, Vanessa," Evan said calmly. "While I was trimming roses in the dirt, my financial auditors were going through the accounts I gave you access to for the wedding planning."
Vanessa’s breath hitched.
"You stole four million dollars from my children's trust fund," Evan said. "Transferred to offshore accounts in the Cayman Islands registered under your brother's name. You thought I was too distracted by my European expansion to notice."
"Evan... please... I'll give it back! All of it!"
"Of course you will," Evan said smoothly. "Because as of five minutes ago, your family's shipping business in Bridgeport no longer exists. My men have seized their docks, foreclosed on their loans, and submitted the evidence of your wire fraud to the Federal Prosecutor."
May you like
He turned toward the conservatory exit.
"You wanted to be a Whitaker, Vanessa. You wanted the power, the money, and the name. Now you're going to get the full weight of the Whitaker legal system."
