Chapter 2 - The Vanguard of Retribution
The offices of Harrington, Thorne & Sterling occupied the top three floors of the International Trust Building on State Street. It was the kind of law firm where the carpets were thick enough to swallow the sound of approaching footsteps and the art on the walls cost more than a suburban subdivision.
Rebecca Vance—Claire’s fiercely protective older sister and a legendary federal prosecutor turned corporate litigation partner—sat behind a massive mahogany desk, tapping a silver pen against a leather pad.
Across from her sat Marcus Sterling, senior managing partner and a man whose legal reputation struck terror into Fortune 500 CEOs.
“Let me get this straight,” Marcus said, adjusting his tortoiseshell glasses as he reviewed the digital scans Claire had transferred via the secure cloud server. “For twenty-five years, Grant Mercer has been filing patents and commercial copyrights under his sole proprietorship, utilizing architectural designs that were exclusively authored, drafted, and engineered by you?”
“Yes,” Claire said, sitting upright in her chair. She wore a tailored charcoal pantsuit, her hair pinned back, looking less like a discarded wife and more like an executive ready for a corporate takeover.
“And he hasn't executed a single assignment of copyright to Mercer Atelier LLC?” Rebecca asked, her eyes gleaming with predatory delight.
“Not one,” Claire confirmed. “He assumed that because we were married, my intellectual property automatically became marital property subject to his corporate restructuring. But under Massachusetts intellectual property law, unregistered creative works created prior to incorporation—or outside the formal scope of an employment contract—remain the sole property of the individual creator unless explicitly transferred in writing.”
Marcus leaned back in his leather chair, letting out a low, appreciative whistle. “My god, Claire. If we file an emergency injunction halting all ongoing construction on the Azure Tower and the North End Waterfront Promenade based on copyright infringement and intellectual property misappropriation, Grant’s entire firm will face an immediate stop-work order.”
“An injunction?” Rebecca shook her head, a shark-like grin spreading across her face. “No. An injunction is too quiet. Grant is hosting his annual ‘Vanguard of Architecture’ gala this Saturday night at the Museum of Fine Arts. It’s his grand coming-out party—the night he’s scheduled to announce his massive merger with Sterling-Vane Development and officially introduce his shiny new twenty-six-year-old girlfriend to Boston society.”
Claire met her sister’s gaze. “You want to strike during the gala?”
“I want to dismantle him in high-definition in front of six hundred of Boston’s elite, the municipal board, and every major financial backer he has,” Rebecca said, leaning forward. “We don’t just sue him for copyright infringement. We file an emergency civil seizure order for corporate asset misappropriation, freeze all corporate accounts pending a forensic audit, and serve him with papers right as he takes the podium to accept his ‘Architect of the Year’ award.”
May you like
Marcus nodded slowly. “It’s aggressive. It’s public. And it will utterly obliterate his credit rating and his merger prospects before the weekend is over.”
“Good,” Claire said softly. “Because he left me thirty minutes to pack my life into cardboard boxes while he paraded his mistress through my dining room. I want him to feel what it’s like to lose everything he built on a foundation of lies.”
