Chapter 6 - The Arrest and the ScarsChaos erupted instantly.
Four armed federal marshals flanked Evelyn and Julian before they could even attempt to run. Handmares snapped onto Julian’s wrists with a harsh metallic click, the sound of his expensive designer suit brushing against the cold steel cuffs.
"Mom! Do something! Make them stop!" Julian screamed, thrashing wildly as a marshal roughly shoved him toward the exit.
Evelyn didn't look at him. Her face was completely devoid of color, her eyes glazed over as she stared blankly at the floor. All her grand ambitions, all her scheming, and all her stolen wealth had vanished in less than an hour. As the marshals led her away, she finally raised her head and looked directly at me.
There was no anger left in her eyes. Only a terrifying, hollow realization.
"You let us do it," Evelyn whispered as she passed my table, her voice trembling. "You knew the whole time."
"You built your own cage, Mother," I replied softly, not moving an inch. "I just handed you the key."
As the heavy oak doors closed behind the weeping prisoners and their federal escorts, the courtroom slowly began to clear out. Reporters crowded around my attorney, who was still blinking in stunned silence, trying to process the magnitude of what had just transpired.
General Thorne lingered behind, stepping closer to me as the gallery emptied.
May you like
"Your father would have been proud, Clara," Thorne murmured, his voice softening. "Arthur Vance was a good man. He didn't deserve what they tried to do to his legacy."
"He wanted to protect the company, General," I replied, tracing the edge of my Silver Star resting in the wooden display case on the table. "And more importantly, he wanted to protect the innocent lives those contracts were supposed to safeguard."
