Chapter 243
The gates opened automatically for the car. They still thought I was the obedient little girl coming to beg for a truce.
The car crunched over the gravel driveway. I looked out the window.
No one in the garden. The front door was slightly ajar. A pile of half-burned papers smoldered on the front lawn, the rain having extinguished the hasty fire.
Arthur wasn’t gardening. He was panicking.
The car stopped.
I opened the door and stepped out. My heels clicked on the stone path.
Click. Click. Click.
I pushed the front door open.
The foyer was in chaos. Drawers had been yanked out, their contents dumped on the floor. A suitcase sat open near the stairs, overflowing with cash and bonds.
“You can’t take that!” Arthur’s voice screamed from the study. “That’s mine!”
I walked toward the sound, the wind catching the hem of my black jacket.
“Yes, Uncle,” I said to the empty hall. “I’m home to take out the trash.”
Arthur Sterling looked nothing like the imposing patriarch who had stood beside me in the boardroom just days ago, playing the role of the victimized father. He was a disheveled mess, his expensive suit rumpled, his face pale and sweating. He frantically fed documents into a shredder that was jammed.
He looked up as I entered, his eyes darting around the room like a trapped animal.
“Skye!” he gasped, backing away from the shredder. “You… what are you doing here? I’m… I’m just organizing some files. Cleaning up the mess Liam left.”
“Organizing?” I picked up a handful of shredded paper from the floor. “Is that what we’re calling obstruction of justice these days?”
Arthur straightened his vest, trying to regain some semblance of authority. “I am the Chairman of this board! I have every right to dispose of outdated material! You may be the CEO on paper, but I built this! And I won’t let you or anyone else see the… the necessary evils I had to commit to save it from Liam’s incompetence.”
“You stole this,” I corrected him calmly. “And now you’re trying to burn the evidence of how you kept it afloat. Liam framed you for the embezzlement, yes. But these?” I kicked a box labeled Petrov Holdings. “These aren’t Liam’s doing, Arthur. These are yours. Money laundering. Tax evasion. The shadow loans you took out to cover the losses.”
I walked past him, deeper into the house. The foyer was dusty. The grand chandelier was dim. It smelled of stagnation.
Yо𝘶𝗿 𝗱𝘪𝗀i𝘵а𝘭 lib𝗿𝗮𝘳у 𝗈𝘯 𝗯𝘦𝗹𝗻𝗼𝘷𝘦𝗅𝘴.𝘤𝗼𝗆
“Skye!” Arthur hurried after me. “You listen to me! I did what I had to do! You think companies run on clean money? You’re naive! You are a disgrace to this family!”
I sat down on the velvet armchair in the center of the living room—Grandfather’s chair. The one Arthur had claimed the day my father died. I crossed my legs and looked at him.
“A disgrace?” I asked. “Interesting word choice for a man who laundered forty million dollars through a shell company in the Cayman Islands last Tuesday. Not the forged signatures Liam made up. The real transfers. The ones you authorized while pretending to be in a coma.”
Arthur froze.
Footsteps thundered down the stairs. Petunia appeared, dragging a Louis Vuitton trunk, followed by Victor, clutching a jewelry box.
“What is she doing here?” Petunia screeched, nearly tripping over her own robe. “Arthur, tell her to leave! We need to go to the airport!”
“Going somewhere, Aunt Petunia?” I asked, my voice cutting through her panic. “I thought you and Victor were out on bail. Isn’t leaving the state a violation of your parole?”
Victor snarled, clutching the jewelry box tighter. “We’re just… taking a vacation. Get out of our way, Skye.”
“That box belongs to the estate,” I said, eyeing the velvet case in his hands. “My mother’s emeralds. You’re looting the house before you run.”
“Proof?” Arthur sputtered, turning back to me, his eyes narrowing. “You have no proof. Those are just wild accusations from a girl who lost her mind.”