Chapter 5 - The Family Fraud
The room erupted into absolute chaos.
"Uncle Richard?!" Thatcher roared, slamming his hands onto the library table. "You gave two hundred and fifty thousand dollars of our family’s trust money to Uncle Richard?!"
"He said he was going to double it!" Bernice cried out, tears finally breaking through her cold exterior, streaking down her face. "Richard said he had an insider track on the new harbor development! He said it was a guaranteed return! I was trying to save the house, Thatcher! I was trying to get the money back before you found out!"
"Richard Vance hasn't had a legitimate business license in five years!" Thatcher yelled, his face turning bright red with fury. "He’s a professional gambler who has been banned from three casinos in Atlantic City!"
I held up my hand, bringing an immediate halt to the shouting.
"David," I said, turning to my attorney. "Run a cross-reference on Apex Capital Management against the commercial mortgage note I purchased."
David immediately pulled out his laptop, his fingers flying across the keyboard as he accessed the public registry and banking database.
Two minutes passed in agonizing silence.
David looked up from his screen, a look of profound disbelief on his face.
"Simone," David said, turning the laptop screen toward me. "Richard Vance didn't just take the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. He’s the person who introduced the high-interest lender to Bernice in the first place."
I stared at the screen. The pieces of the puzzle suddenly clicked together with terrifying, mathematical precision.
"Richard set her up," I whispered, the realization washing over me. "He knew Bernice was desperate. He introduced her to a predatory private lending firm that he secretly received a ten percent finder's fee from. He pushed her to leverage the estate, took a quarter-million dollar direct cut, and left her to take the fall when the loan defaulted."
Thatcher sat down heavily in a chair, holding his head in his hands. "My own uncle... stripped my mother clean and left her to drown."
Bernice sat frozen in her armchair, weeping quietly into a handkerchief. The proud, arrogant matriarch who had smashed a cake into my face two days ago had vanished completely, replaced by a broken, foolish woman who had been systematically dismantled by her own brother.
I walked over to Bernice, standing right in front of her.
"Bernice," I said calmly.
She looked up at me through swollen, tear-filled eyes, expecting another blow, another insult, another display of power.
"Where is Richard right now?" I asked.
"He's... he's at his penthouse in the city," Bernice sobbed out. "He told me he was flying to Miami tonight for a business trip."
I looked at my watch. It was 2:15 PM.
"David," I said, turning to my lawyer. "Call the State Financial Crimes Division. Tell them we have documented proof of grand larceny, trust embezzlement, and predatory loan-sharking involving Apex Capital."
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I turned back to Thatcher and Odalis.
"Get your coats," I said softly. "We're going to the city to pay Uncle Richard a visit before his flight."
