Chapter 5 - The Rat in the Cell
With Arthur Vance locked in a high-security federal holding facility and his legal empire collapsing under a mountain of federal indictments, the dominoes began to fall rapidly.
Three days after the gala, Naomi and I sat in a private attorney-client visitation room at the Dallas County Jail. On the other side of the thick plexiglass window sat Ethan.
In just one week, he looked as if he had aged ten years. His designer suit had been replaced by a coarse yellow inmate jumpsuit. His hair was messy, his eyes were bloodshot, and his hands trembled as he picked up the gray plastic telephone handset.
I picked up my phone.
"You look terrible, Ethan," I said casually.
"Claire... please," Ethan begged, his voice cracking with desperation, tears welling in his red-rimmed eyes. "You have to tell the prosecutor to reduce the charges. Arthur’s people... they're inside this prison, Claire! They're going to kill me! They think I leaked the tapes to the FBI!"
"You didn't leak them," I reminded him coolly. "Grace found them. You left them in your safe because you were too arrogant to think anyone in a uniform could outsmart you."
"Claire, I was forced into it!" Ethan lied desperately, pressing his palms against the glass. "Arthur threatened me! He threatened us! Everything I did—the offshore accounts, the property transfers—I did it to protect you from him!"
"Do you really expect me to believe that?" I asked, raising an eyebrow. "Is that why you gave Chloe my mother’s emerald necklace? Was that part of your master plan to protect me?"
Ethan flinched as if I had slapped him. He looked down at the metal table, unable to meet my eyes.
"Chloe has already taken a plea bargain, Ethan," Naomi chimed in over the secondary receiver. "She gave a full three-hour deposition detailing how you promised to sell the Royal Lane estate, transfer the proceeds to an account in Dubai, and leave Mrs. Carter penniless while you two fled the country."
"She’s lying to save herself!" Ethan yelled, slamming his fist against the glass.
"Everyone is saving themselves, Ethan," I said softly. "Because nobody loves you. They loved your money, your influence, and the fake prestige you stole from my family name. But now that the money is gone, you're just a small, lonely thief in a yellow jumpsuit."
"What do you want from me, Claire?" Ethan whimpered, entirely broken. "What do you want?"
"I want everything," I said, my voice dropping into an icy whisper. "You will sign the full, uncontested divorce settlement today. You will relinquish every stock, asset, and claim to Carter Financial, Vance Global, and my mother’s estate. And you will give a full, sworn confession to the Federal Prosecutor detailing every single corrupt judge, politician, and businessman Arthur Vance ever bribed in this city."
Ethan stared at me, trembling. "If I rat on Arthur's network... I'll go to federal prison for twenty years!"
"If you don't," Naomi added smoothly, "you’ll go to state prison for forty years on identity theft and attempted grand larceny charges. And you won't have federal witness protection."
Ethan looked at the legal documents Naomi held against the glass. He knew he had no moves left. The grand strategist, the golden boy of Dallas, had been backed into a terminal checkmate by the woman he thought was just a naive housewife who signed whatever he put in front of her.
"Give me the pen," Ethan whispered weakly.
Ten minutes later, the signed divorce papers and full federal confession were secured in Naomi’s briefcase.
As I stood up to leave, Ethan called out one last time through the phone. "Claire... did you ever love me? Even at the beginning?"
May you like
I turned back, looking at him through the glass with total indifference.
"I loved the man I thought you were, Ethan," I said softly. "Too bad that man never actually existed."
