Chapter 4 - The Legal Execution
The safe location was a private, secure penthouse overlooking the financial district. By 2:00 AM, the room was filled with the top legal minds of the country, along with my uncle Arthur, Ethan, and myself. The iron box sat open on the table.
Ethan carefully lifted the documents using archival gloves. He scanned the pages, his legal eyes analyzing every clause. After a long, tense silence, he let out a soft breath and looked up at Arthur, then at me.
"Julian wasn't entirely wrong, but Marcus misunderstood what he had," Ethan explained, spreading the documents out. "This isn't an asset registry that invalidates Arthur’s ownership. This is a trust agreement created by Clara’s grandfather. It states that fifty-one percent of the Vance Medical Foundation’s voting shares were placed in a blind trust, to be inherited by Clara on her twenty-fifth birthday—or upon her legal divorce from any marriage that threatened her personal safety."
I stared at the papers. "So... I don't just belong to the Vance family. I own the majority of the foundation?"
"Exactly," Arthur smiled warmly, reaching out to pat my hand. "Your mother knew that the wealth of our family could attract dangerous people. She hid this trust so you could grow up normally, away from the vultures. She wanted you to have a choice. Marcus Hastings found a fragment of a reference to this trust and assumed it was a dirty secret he could use as leverage. He didn't realize it was the ultimate weapon to destroy him."
"And tomorrow is your twenty-fifth birthday, Clara," Ethan added, his eyes locked onto mine with a mixture of respect and something deeper. "And your divorce hearing with Julian is scheduled for 9:00 AM. The timing is perfect."
The next morning, the high-court family division room was packed with journalists, despite the judge’s orders for a private hearing. The public interest in the Vance-Hastings scandal was too massive to contain.
Julian sat at the defense table, wearing a drab, standard suit provided to inmates under house arrest. His hair was messy, his eyes sunken and surrounded by dark circles. He looked like a man who hadn't slept in weeks. When I walked into the courtroom, wearing a stunning, flawless white tailored dress, his eyes lit up with a desperate, pathetic hope.
"Clara," he whispered as I took my seat across from him. "Clara, please look at me. I saved you last night. I called you. I warned you about Marcus. Please tell the judge to be lenient. We can restart. We can move away."
I didn't look at him. Ethan stepped forward as my lead counsel, placing a thick stack of documents on the podium.
"Your Honor," Ethan’s voice resonated through the courtroom, clear and commanding. "We are not here to negotiate a standard asset division. We are presenting evidence of extreme marital misconduct, financial embezzlement, and a direct threat to my client’s life. We request an immediate, absolute dissolution of marriage with zero alimony, zero asset distribution to the defendant, and a permanent restraining order."
Julian’s lawyer stood up, sweating profusely. "Your Honor, my client confesses to emotional infidelity, but he was a victim of extortion by the Hastings family. Furthermore, he did warn the plaintiff about an attack on her life last night. This shows remorse and a desire to protect her. He deserves a fair share of the marital assets—specifically the property on Emerald Hill."
"The property on Emerald Hill was purchased with funds my client inherited from her mother," Ethan countered sharply, flashing a document on the court screens. "Furthermore, we have the forensic financial report from last night. The keycard used by the attackers to enter the Vance headquarters was registered to Dr. Julian Vance. He didn't just warn her; he provided the access code to Marcus Hastings in exchange for a promise that Marcus would help him flee the country. He only called my client when he realized Marcus was going to double-cross him."
Julian’s face went dead white. He looked at his lawyer, who silently closed his briefcase and shook his head. The lie was exposed.
"You monster," Eleanor, Julian’s mother, wailed from the gallery, realizing her son had completely destroyed any chance of mercy.
The judge looked at Julian with deep disgust. "The court finds the defendant’s actions abhorrent and criminally fraudulent. The petition for divorce is granted immediately under absolute fault of the defendant. Dr. Julian Vance will receive nothing. Furthermore, based on the new evidence of complicity in the corporate attack, his bail is revoked. Bailiffs, take him into federal custody."
As the guards stepped forward to chain his ankles, Julian broke down completely. He threw himself across the table, trying to reach me. "Clara! No! You can't do this to me! I made you! You were nothing before you married me! You're a monster! A cold-blooded monster!"
I stood up, looking down at him with absolute calm. "You didn't make me, Julian. You just hid me from who I really was. Enjoy your new home."
May you like
As he was dragged out of the courtroom, his screams fading down the corridor, the clock struck 10:00 AM.
Ethan turned to me, a brilliant smile on his face. He checked his watch. "Happy twenty-fifth birthday, Chairman Clara. It’s time to take your throne."
