Chapter 5 - The Lobby Confrontation
The lobby of Vance Enterprises was a cathedral of marble, glass, and polished chrome. At one o'clock in the morning, it should have been a ghost town. Instead, it looked like a battlefield.
Flashes from camera phones and professional DSLR lenses popped blindingly against the white stone pillars. Reporters from the city's major newspapers and digital investigative blogs swarmed the perimeter, shouting overlapping questions about corporate corruption, family feuds, and federal investigations.
In the center of the lobby stood Damian Sterling—tall, impeccably dressed in a white tuxedo jacket, his face flushed with manic, desperate bravado. Beside him stood three heavies from the south side docks, their hands tucked menacingly inside their jackets.
When the private elevator doors slid open, the room went dead silent.
Dominic Vance stepped out into the lobby. He didn't rush. He didn't raise his voice. He walked with the slow, terrifying grace of an executioner walking to the scaffold.
And right beside him, matching his pace step for step, was Daisy.
Wearing her sharp slate-gray pantsuit, her dark hair pulled back into a sleek ponytail, she looked less like a corporate auditor and more like a high-stakes queen ready to claim the board.
Damian’s eyes widened when he saw Dominic, but they narrowed with pure venom when he spotted Daisy.
"Well, well, well," Damian sneered, his voice projecting across the lobby for the benefit of the gathered reporters. "Look at this. The great Dominic Vance, reduced to hiding behind a glorified waitress he pulled off the floor of a cheap restaurant!"
Murmurs rippled through the press corps. Flashbulbs intensified, blinding white light bouncing off the glass walls.
Dominic stopped three feet from his cousin. His face was a mask of carved granite. "You brought reporters into a private corporate building, Damian. Have you completely lost your mind?"
"I'm saving my own skin, cousin!" Damian laughed, a reckless, hysterical sound. "Everyone in this city knows you've been running illegal shell companies through the docks to fund your little political puppets! I have the documents right here. I’m blowing the whistle on the whole corrupt operation!"
Damian thrust a thick manila folder into the air, waving it triumphantly toward the cameras.
The reporters surged forward, shoving microphones toward him.
Daisy stepped forward before Dominic could move. She didn't look at Damian. She looked directly at the reporters, her voice cutting through the chaotic noise with crystal-clear authority.
"Those documents you're holding, Mr. Sterling," Daisy said loudly, pointing a finger at the manila folder, "are forged."
Damian flinched, his manic smile faltering for a fraction of a second. "Shut up, you little nobody! You don't know what you're talking about—"
"I know exactly what I'm talking about," Daisy interrupted, pulling her own tablet from her leather folio. "Because yesterday, I finished auditing the exact accounts where you tried to dump twenty-four million dollars of embezzled funds. You didn't find corruption in Dominic's ledgers, Damian. You tried to frame him to cover up your own financial ruin."
The lobby erupted into absolute chaos. Reporters shouted questions over one another, cameras flashing furiously as the narrative violently flipped before their eyes.
Damian’s face drained of all color. Panic flared in his eyes, replacing the reckless bravado. "She's lying! It's a conspiracy! Arrest her!"
He lunged forward, his hand clawing desperately at the manila folder as if trying to strike Daisy across the face.
Before Damian’s hand could even complete its arc, Dominic moved.
In a blur of motion, Dominic caught Damian’s wrist mid-air, twisting it with a cold, ruthless efficiency that made a sickening pop echo across the marble floor. Damian shrieked in agony, dropping to his knees as the fake documents scattered across the floor like autumn leaves.
Dominic leaned down, his face inches from his cousin's trembling ear, his voice dropping into a lethal whisper that every microphone in the room picked up.
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"You threatened my company," Dominic murmured softly. "And then you threatened my people. Enjoy federal prison, Damian. You're going to be there for a very, very long time."
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