Chapter 5 - The Confrontation at the Office
By 7:00 AM the following morning, news of the incident had already begun to ripple through our social circles, but I didn't have time to mourn or rest.
I had spent the rest of the night securing the house. I hired a private security team to guard the perimeter of the estate, changed all the digital lock codes, and installed new high-definition surveillance cameras facing the driveway. Zoey was fast asleep upstairs under the care of a trusted, long-time nanny whom I had brought in early.
At 8:30 AM, dressed in a sharp navy-blue power suit, I walked into the headquarters of Sterling Cosmetics in downtown Asheville.
The atmosphere in the corporate lobby was tense. As soon as I walked through the glass doors, my executive assistant, Sarah, rushed over with a stack of urgent documents.
"Jade, we have a major problem," Sarah whispered, her face pale. "Thomas arrived thirty minutes ago. He’s inside the executive boardroom, trying to force the accounting department to execute an emergency wire transfer of five hundred thousand dollars out of the operational reserve!"
My eyes narrowed. "Did he?"
"He told the CFO that you were indisposed due to a family emergency and that he had full marital authorization to sign off on corporate funds," Sarah added.
"Let's see how long his authorization lasts," I said, striding purposefully down the wide marble hallway toward the main boardroom.
Inside the glass-walled boardroom, Thomas was standing over our Chief Financial Officer, Marcus, slamming his hand on the mahogany table.
"I am the Vice President of Strategic Operations!" Thomas roared, his eyes bloodshot, his shirt wrinkled from spending the night in his car or a cheap motel. "I have signing authority! Transfer the funds to the JS Inheritance account right now, Marcus, or I will fire you before noon!"
Marcus looked extremely uncomfortable, holding a pen over the transfer authorization form. "Thomas, Mrs. Sterling explicitly instructed that all transfers over fifty thousand dollars require her dual signature—"
"I don't care what she said! I am her husband!" Thomas yelled, grabbing Marcus’s shoulder.
"You were her husband," I said, pushing the double doors open.
The room went dead silent. Marcus immediately stood up, looking visibly relieved.
Thomas spun around, his mouth twitching with frantic energy. "Jade! Thank God you're here. Tell Marcus to clear this wire! My mother is being held at the county lockup on a fifty-thousand-dollar cash bail, and Brenda’s lawyers in Ohio just served me with a breach-of-contract lawsuit because the monthly payment failed! I need this money right now!"
I walked calmly to the head of the boardroom table, sat down in my leather chair, and crossed my hands.
"Marcus, please step outside and bring security," I said gently.
"Yes, Mrs. Sterling," Marcus said, snatching the transfer forms and hurrying out the door.
Once the door closed, Thomas slammed both palms onto the table, leaning over me.
"Are you trying to ruin me?!" he hissed. "My mother is sitting in a cold cell with real criminals! She’s seventy-two! If she doesn't get her medication and bail out today, she could have a stroke! And Brenda is threatening to go to the press about Jackson!"
I looked up at him, unbothered by his towering presence.
"Let her go to the press," I said softly. "I'd love for the press to know that my ex-husband embezzled nearly a million dollars from a female-founded business to support a secret second family while his mother beat my two-year-old child."
"It wasn't embezzlement!" Thomas shouted, his voice cracking. "We're married! What’s yours is mine!"
"Not according to section 4B of the prenuptial agreement you signed seven years ago, Thomas," I replied, pulling out a bound legal document and laying it on the table. "You signed a strict sole-proprietorship clause. Sterling Cosmetics is 100% my separate property. You were an employee. An employee who just committed corporate theft."
Thomas’s chest heaved. He realized he was losing every piece of leverage he thought he had.
"Jade..." he dropped his aggressive tone, stepping around the table and trying to adopt a soft, pleading voice. "Think about our family. Think about Zoey. Do you want her to grow up with her father in prison? With her grandmother in jail? What will people say at the country club? What will your clients think?"
"My clients respect strength, Thomas," I said, looking him dead in the eye. "And as for Zoey... I am protecting her from a toxic parasite and a convicted child abuser."
At that moment, the boardroom doors opened, and two armed corporate security guards stepped inside, accompanied by two Asheville police officers.
"Thomas Swift," the lead police officer announced. "You are being detained under suspicion of grand larceny and corporate embezzlement pending a formal warrant from the District Attorney."
Thomas gasped, taking two steps back until his lower back hit the floor-to-ceiling glass window.
"Jade! No! Don't do this!" he shrieked as the officers moved in, grabbing his arms and pulling them behind his back. "You can't do this to me! I made you! I supported you when you were nothing!"
"You didn't make me, Thomas," I said, standing up and adjusting my jacket. "You just leeched off me while I built an empire."
As the officers hauled Thomas out of the executive suite in front of dozens of staring employees, he screamed obscenities, his frantic voice echoing down the corridors of the building he used to walk through like a king.
Sarah walked back into the room, holding an iPad. "Jade... your corporate attorney is on line one. And... there's a woman on line two claiming to be Brenda Vance. She says she wants to make a deal."
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I took a deep breath, picked up the desk phone, and pressed line two.
"This is Jade Sterling," I said into the receiver. "You have thirty seconds to explain why I shouldn't add you as a co-conspirator to a federal wire fraud indictment."
