Chapter 6 - The Deposition
Three weeks later, the war moved into a cold, brightly lit deposition room on the third floor of the Federal Courthouse in downtown Raleigh.
Outside, the May sunshine was warm, casting long shadows across the granite steps where dozens of news vans, camera crews, and reporters had gathered. The story had broken wide across the state: CHARLOTTE SOCIALITES INDICTED IN MULTI-MILLION HEALTHCARE FRAUD SCANDAL.
Inside the room, the atmosphere was clinical, quiet, and deadly sharp.
At the head of the conference table sat Assistant U.S. Attorney Eleanor Vance, flanked by two court reporters and a digital court recording system.
To her right sat Emily and me. Emily was wearing a clean gray wool suit, her hair pulled back into a neat braid, her face healed except for a faint, silver scar near her cheekbone where Ethan’s ring had caught her skin. She looked composed, quiet, and completely ready.
Across the table sat the three defendants.
They didn't look like Myers Park royalty anymore.
Ethan was wearing an oversized orange county jumpsuit, his wrists restrained by a belly-chain system, his eyes sunken and bloodshot from twenty-one days in solitary protective custody. Brandon sat beside him in a plain brown institutional suit, his hands shaking incessantly.
And Margaret sat in the middle.
She was wearing a plain, off-the-rack navy dress provided by her court-appointed public defender—a young, overworked attorney named Thomas Klein, who looked like he hadn't slept since the indictment dropped. Her hair was unstyled, grey roots showing at her temples, her hands completely devoid of diamonds, gold, or polish.
"This deposition is being recorded under federal seal," Eleanor Vance announced into the microphone. "Case reference United States versus Margaret Prescott, Ethan Prescott, and Brandon Prescott. Witness present: Emily Hart Prescott."
Eleanor looked at Thomas Klein, the public defender. "Counselor, is your client ready to proceed?"
Klein leaned over to whisper to Margaret. "Mrs. Prescott, remember my advice. Answer only what is asked, do not raise your voice, and do not offer opinion testimony."
Margaret didn't look at her lawyer. She fixed her red-rimmed, furious eyes directly on my daughter.
"Let's get this over with," Margaret spat quietly.
Eleanor turned to Emily. "Mrs. Hart, please state your full name for the record."
"Emily Victoria Hart," my daughter answered, her voice ringing clear against the soundproof walls. She deliberately omitted her married surname.
"Emily," Eleanor began, pulling a thick blue binder forward. "Please describe the events of September fourteenth, 2025, at the residence located on Hermitage Road in Charlotte."
Emily took a small sip of water from a plastic cup, set it down, and looked directly into Ethan’s eyes.
"At approximately six-thirty p.m.," Emily began, keeping her pace steady and unhurried, "I was in the home office printing digital medical supply inventory logs that I had discovered on the secondary server. Ethan entered the room, saw the documents, and demanded I hand over my personal tablet."
"Did you comply?" Eleanor asked.
"No," Emily replied. "I told him I was leaving the home and taking the evidence to my mother. At that point, Ethan grabbed my upper arms, threw me against the mahogany bookcase, and called his brother Brandon into the room."
"Objection!" Ethan blurted out, shaking his chains against the table. "She’s lying! She threatened to ruin my family because I refused to buy her a house in Wrightsville Beach!"
"Shut up, Ethan!" Klein, his public defender, hissed under his breath, grabbing Ethan’s arm.
"Mr. Prescott," Eleanor said coldly, without even raising her head from her notes. "One more outburst and I will request the federal marshal remove you to a holding cell and proceed in absentia."
Ethan snapped his jaw shut, his face flushing dark purple.
"Continue, Emily," Eleanor said.
"Brandon held my arms behind my back," Emily said, her tone as clinical as a medical report. "While Ethan reached into my pocket, took my personal cell phone, and smashed it three times against the hearth stone. When I tried to run out onto the terrace, Ethan shoved me down the stone steps. My face struck an iron planter."
"And where was Mrs. Margaret Prescott during this assault?" Eleanor asked, pointing her pen toward Margaret.
Emily looked at Margaret.
"Margaret was standing by the French doors," Emily revealed. "She was holding her glass of wine. When I was bleeding on the stone terrace, she looked down at me and said, 'Clean yourself up, Emily. You look like trash, and the caterers are arriving in an hour.'"
A heavy, sickening silence descended on the room.
The court reporter’s fingers flew across the stenotype machine, recording every syllable for the federal trial record.
Margaret leaned forward, her elbows hitting the table, her face twisting into a mask of pure, unadulterated venom.
"You ungrateful little beggar," Margaret whispered across the table, her voice shaking with rage. "We took you out of a dirty military housing project! We put designer clothes on your back! We let you sit at our table! And you destroy our family over a few bruises?"
I didn't say a word. I didn't need to.
Emily leaned forward too, coming within twelve inches of Margaret’s face.
"My mother taught me that a home is built on honor, Margaret," Emily said, her voice dropping into a register so cool, so firm, that it chilled the air in the room. "You didn't take me out of anything. You invited a lion's daughter into your house, and you were stupid enough to think she wouldn't call the pride when you tried to hurt her."
Margaret stared at Emily. Her mouth opened, closed, and then opened again—but no sound came out.
For the first time since this nightmare began, Margaret Prescott had run completely out of words.
Thomas Klein slowly pulled his file folders together, stood up, and looked at Prosecutor Eleanor Vance.
"Ms. Vance," Klein said, his voice flat with complete surrender. "My clients wish to request a fifteen-minute recess to discuss a global plea agreement."
May you like
Eleanor closed her blue binder with a quiet, satisfying thud.
"You have fifteen minutes, Mr. Klein," Eleanor said, looking at the three broken socialites across the table. "And tell your clients... the plea terms start with twenty years in a federal penitentiary."
