Chapter 2 - The Yellow Envelope
At 7:02 AM on Monday morning, my phone vibrated on my nightstand.
Because I had blocked Sienna's personal number, the call came through my main corporate desk line at Vane-Vanguard headquarters, routed directly to my mobile app.
I let it ring three times before picking it up. I didn't say hello. I simply listened.
"Joanna?! What the hell is this?!"
Sienna’s voice was screeching, stripped entirely of the smooth, sweet, artificial tone she used at Sunday dinners. In the background, I could hear Brett swearing loudly and Maverick crying.
"Good morning, Sienna," I said, my voice as calm as a calm lake.
"There is a sheriff's deputy standing on my porch!" she screamed, her breath coming in ragged gasps. "He just handed me an eviction notice! He said our house is in foreclosure and we have thirty days to surrender the keys to a corporate entity called Vane-Vanguard! Did you do this?! How could you do this to your nephew?!"
"I didn't do anything to Maverick, Sienna," I replied smoothly, leaning back against my pillows. "You told him that servants don't sit at the table. A servant doesn't own a house, Sienna. But the CEO of Vane-Vanguard Capital does."
Silence fell over the line—a thick, suffocating silence as the pieces began to click together in Sienna’s mind.
"You... you own Apex Financial?" she whispered, her voice suddenly trembling. "That's impossible. You work in computer maintenance!"
"I never said I worked in computer maintenance," I said softly. "Uncle Howard said that four years ago because he couldn't comprehend what algorithmic venture capital was, and I never bothered to correct him because it made Sunday dinners shorter."
"Joanna, please!" Sienna’s tone shifted instantly into hysterical pleading. "Brett’s firm lost two major clients last month! We were relying on the balloon payment extension! Mom said she would cover the forty thousand dollars from Dad’s trust fund this week—"
"Mom can't cover it," I interrupted. "I revoked Mom's access to the trust dividends at midnight. The thirty thousand dollars she receives every month is gone."
A sharp gasp echoed from the other end of the line. I could hear Brett taking the phone from her hand.
"Joanna! Look, it's Brett," my brother-in-law's panicked voice came through. "Listen to me, we can talk about this like adults! Maverick is just a kid, he didn't mean anything by what he said! I’ll make him write you an apology letter! I’ll make him clean your apartment! Just pull back the foreclosure notice! If my firm finds out I'm being evicted, I'll lose my partnership!"
"You had three years to treat me like a human being, Brett," I said quietly. "Every Sunday, you sat at that table, ate the food I bought and cooked, and laughed whenever Howard or Sienna made a joke at my expense. You didn't care about my feelings then. Don't pretend to care about my nephew's manners now."
"Joanna, wait—!"
I hung up.
Thirty seconds later, my mother’s landline number appeared on my screen. I declined the call.
Then Justin called. Declined.
Then Uncle Howard called. Declined.
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By 8:30 AM, I was dressed in a charcoal-gray tailored suit from Armani, my hair pulled back into a sleek, professional bun. I took the private elevator down to the underground garage, stepped into my dark-blue Bentley Continental, and drove toward the corporate financial district.
The storm was just beginning, and for the first time in my life, I wasn't running from it. I was directing the wind.
