Chapter 7
The storm broke two weeks later.
I was having lunch at a high-end bistro downtown when she appeared.
Saraphina looked nothing like the untouchable ice queen from the day of our divorce.
She looked exhausted.
Dark circles shadowed her eyes beneath poorly concealed makeup, and her usual confidence had been replaced by a hesitant, uncertain stiffness.
She walked over to my booth and stood there, clutching her designer handbag like a shield.
“Alex,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.
I dabbed my mouth with a napkin and looked up at her with polite detachment.
“Miss Dubois. Can I help you?”
She flinched at the formality.
“I need to talk to you. Please. Can I sit?”
“Make it quick. I have a board meeting at two.”
She slid into the seat across from me, her eyes darting nervously.
“It’s about the Eastern Transit Project. The zoning board froze our permits. They said a private firm, Aegis Capital, holds the primary rights, and that Vance Logistics is under audit.”
“That sounds like a regulatory issue. You should consult a lawyer, not your ex-husband.”
“Alex, please,” she pleaded, reaching across the table for my hand.
I pulled back immediately as if burned.
Her hand hovered in the air, trembling, before she slowly withdrew it. A look of profound hurt crossed her face.
“I know Aegis Capital is you and Isabella,” she choked out, fighting back tears. “I know you’re punishing me. But Julian didn’t know the Eastern Project was yours. If this audit goes through, Vance Logistics will collapse, and the Dubois family will lose fifty million dollars. My grandfather… he’s out of the hospital, but a hit like this could kill him.”
“Don’t use the old man to manipulate me, Saraphina,” I said, my voice dropping into a dangerous register. “It won’t work anymore.”
I leaned forward slightly.
“I’m not punishing you. I’m protecting my investments. Julian Vance is a fraud. If you bothered to look at his ledgers instead of his face, you’d see he’s been funneling Dubois money into shell companies in the Caymans.”
Saraphina stared at me, pale and shaken.
“You’re lying,” she whispered. “You’re just jealous.”
“Jealous?”
I let out a genuine laugh, loud enough to draw the attention of several nearby tables.
“Saraphina, the day you handed me those divorce papers was the greatest day of my life. You freed me from a cage I didn’t even realize I was rotting in.”
Her breath hitched.
The truth of my words seemed to hit her like a physical blow.
In the original plot, my desperate clinginess had fed her ego.
My total, unshakable indifference was destroying it.
“I have proof,” I continued. “And I’m handing it over to the SEC on Friday. If you want to save your family, sever all financial ties with Vance Logistics by midnight on Thursday. If you stand with him, you fall with him.”
I stood up and left a hundred-dollar bill on the table for my meal.
“Goodbye, Saraphina.”
“Alex…” she sobbed, burying her face in her hands.
I walked out without looking back.