Chapter 4 - The Exposed Ledger
The sound of my voice hitting the ballroom was like an explosion.
Graham stumbled back two steps, his eyes wide with utter terror. “Eleanor? You... you can speak?”
Savannah gasped, clutching her mother’s arm as Victoria held her bruised cheek in shock. “Her speech... she was supposed to be brain-damaged!”
“Brain-damaged?” I said, turning my wheelchair slightly using my right hand controller. My left arm, which had been 'paralyzed' for eighteen months, slowly lifted off the armrest. I reached up and unclipped the fake feeding tube from beneath my blouse, dropping it onto the marble floor.
The entire room went dead silent. Three hundred millionaires, politicians, and news executives watched in absolute disbelief.
“My stroke was real, Graham,” I said, looking my ex-husband dead in the eye. “The poison your mistress slipped into my evening tea for six months was real, too.”
Savannah’s face drained of every drop of color. “That’s... that’s a lie! She’s insane!”
Harrison stood up, pulling a silver flash drive from his pocket and tossing it onto the main head table.
“That flash drive contains six hundred hours of high-definition video from Eleanor’s private suite,” Harrison announced to the room. “It shows Savannah Ardell bribing Eleanor’s night nurse to administer heavy doses of neuro-inhibitors to keep her paralyzed.”
Murmurs of horror swept through the crowd. Guests began pulling out their phones, filming the scene as the fairy-tale wedding devolved into a criminal nightmare.
“And that’s not all,” I added, my voice cutting through the murmurs. “Victoria, your real estate firm, Ardell Holdings, signed a ninety-million-dollar bridge loan with Whitaker-Vance Logistics last week, using Graham’s forged signature on my power of attorney documents.”
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Victoria backed away, her hands trembling. “You... you couldn't know about that...”
“I owned the bank that issued the loan, Victoria,” I revealed with a cold, sharp smile. “Five minutes ago, when I tapped my armrest, my bank called the loan due immediately. As of 8:15 PM tonight, Ardell Holdings is in default.”
