Chapter 6 - The Fall of Julian
"Julian Vance," a stern federal agent announced, stepping through the parted, whispering crowd of billionaires and socialites. "You are under arrest for corporate fraud, embezzlement, and witness tampering."
Julian’s lawyer instantly took two steps away from him, raising his hands in surrender. Julian was trembling, sweat pouring down his forehead, ruining his slicked-back hair.
"Clara, please!" Julian begged, his arrogant facade completely shattering. He fell to his knees on the plush carpet, practically crawling toward me. "Please, tell them to stop! I'm your husband! I'm the father of your child! You can't do this to me!"
I looked down at him. I remembered the nights I had cried myself to sleep, starving, terrified of his temper. I remembered the courtroom, where he tried to leave me pregnant and homeless in the dead of winter.
"You were a lesson, Julian," I said coldly, my voice steady. "And the lesson is over."
I turned my back on him. The agents hauled a screaming, crying Julian to his feet, slapping heavy steel handcuffs onto his wrists. They dragged him out of the ballroom, his frantic pleas fading into the hallway.
The ballroom was stunned into silence. Then, slowly, someone started to clap. Then another. Within seconds, the entire room erupted into a standing ovation.
Eleanor placed an arm around my waist, pulling me close. "Brilliant, my darling. Absolutely brilliant."
The next few months were a legal slaughterhouse. Julian’s company was seized by the federal government. His assets were liquidated to pay back his defrauded investors. Without his money and his status, the men in prison showed him the exact same mercy he had shown me: absolutely none. He was sentenced to fifteen years in a maximum-security federal penitentiary.
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He sent me one letter from prison, begging to see Leo. I tossed it directly into the blazing fireplace of the Sterling library and watched his desperate words turn to ash. He was a ghost, a nightmare that could no longer hurt me. I had finally severed the chain.
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