Chapter 5 - Stripped Bare
Seraphina snapped her fingers. Two female private investigators stepped into the room, holding large, black industrial plastic bins.
"What is this?" Genevieve sobbed, shrinking back.
"Every single item you are wearing, carrying, or possessing was purchased using funds stolen from my corporate accounts," Seraphina said calmly. "The luxury dresses, the jewelry, the coats, the bags, the watches—even the shoes on your feet. You have two minutes to strip down to your basic undergarments and place everything into those bins."
"What?!" Clarice shrieked, clutching her mink coat to her chest. "You can't strip us naked! That's barbaric! It's freezing outside!"
"You left my daughter in a frozen apartment for seventy-four days without a blanket," Sterling said, stepping forward, his presence suffocating the room. "You have ninety seconds before my guards assist you."
Horrified, weeping, and shivering with shame, Clarice unbuttoned her thousands-of-dollars mink coat and threw it into the bin. She tore off her diamond earrings, her gold bangles, and her designer shoes, dropping them piece by piece into the plastic containers.
Genevieve was hysterically crying as she stripped off her leather jacket, her Chanel boots, and her luxury watches, reducing herself to a pathetic, shivering figure in plain leggings and a basic undershirt.
Thaddius sat on the floor, staring blankly ahead as the male guards stripped him of his tailored cashmere sweater, his Italian leather shoes, his Rolex, and his wallet.
"Your luggage downstairs in the SUV has already been confiscated and impounded as evidence of grand embezzlement," Seraphina informed them coldly. "Inside those paper bags on the table, you will find three pairs of gray institutional sweats and rubber sandals. Put them on."
With broken spirits, the three of them dragged themselves to the table, pulling on the cheap, oversized gray sweatpants and sweatshirts. The contrast was humiliating: three people who had spent the morning in a seven-star Swiss resort were now dressed like inmates awaiting booking.
"Why?" Thaddius whimpered, his head bowed, tears dropping onto the floor. "Why didn't you just call the police the day you were saved? Why drag this out?"
Seraphina walked over to the floor-to-ceiling window, looking out over the grand skyline of New York City—the city her family had helped build.
"Because, Thaddius," Seraphina said softly, "if I had arrested you seventy-four days ago, you would have believed you were caught because of a bad stroke of luck. You would have hired high-priced defense attorneys using my money. You would have spun a story in the media that you were a tragic husband suffering from burnout. I needed you to show the entire world exactly who you were."
May you like
She turned back to face them.
"I needed you to spend seventy-four days proving your own malicious intent. Every transaction you made was a confession. Every toast you drank was evidence. You built your own cage, Thaddius. I simply let you choose the color of the bars."
