Chapter 6 - The Unraveling
For forty-eight hours, the Vance family descended into sheer madness.
Sarah sat at my kitchen table, scrolling through her iPad with fierce, vindictive delight. “You have to see this, Claire. Vanessa’s Instagram stories have gone completely dark. But her maid of honor posted a picture of an empty wine glass with the caption: *‘When the venue starts acting up 48 hours before the I-Do’s... praying for miracles.’*”
“Ryan called his firm’s partners yesterday,” Rachel reported over a secure video link. “He tried to liquidate his equity stake in Vance & Vance Architecture to raise the two hundred thousand dollars the Grand Del Mar is demanding. But under their partnership agreement, an emergency buyout requires a sixty-day notice and unanimous board approval. His partners denied the request. They already caught wind that Apex Bank froze his commercial accounts.”
“What about Marcus?” I asked.
“Marcus broke,” Rachel smiled, cold and sharp. “Apex Bank gave him a choice: cooperate fully with their internal fraud investigation or face immediate referral to the United States Attorney’s Office for federal bank fraud. Marcus sang like a canary. He handed over text messages from Ryan instructing him to forge your name, bypass identity verification, and expedite the credit line specifically to pay the hotel before the Sterlings asked questions.”
I took a sip of hot tea. “Does Ryan know Marcus flipped?”
“Not yet. Ryan thinks he’s still in the fight. He managed to scrape together a fifty-thousand-dollar non-refundable cash deposit from his mother’s retirement savings to keep the hotel from canceling outright until Saturday morning. The resort gave him an ultimatum: the remaining balance must be cleared by certified cashier’s check by 10:00 AM on the morning of the wedding, or the doors remain locked, the power stays off, and the staff will be dismissed.”
“He doesn't have the money,” I said.
“No,” Rachel agreed. “He doesn't. Which means he only has one card left to play.”
“Richard Sterling.”
“Bingo. Ryan is going to go to his future father-in-law on the morning of the wedding, fabricate some elaborate sob story about an offshore bank delay, and beg him to cover the tab to save the family’s public reputation.”
I set my mug down. “Then that is where we will be.”
Sarah looked up, her eyes wide. “Claire, you’re not actually going to his wedding?”
May you like
“No,” I said, looking out toward the Pacific horizon. “I’m going to a business meeting. Harbor Bridge Holdings was contracted to host a gala. As the sole owner of Harbor Bridge, it’s my fiduciary duty to ensure the contract is properly terminated.”
***
