Chapter 7 - The Reckoning of Garrick
With Miriam headed to state prison for twenty-two years, all legal and public focus shifted to Garrick Vance.
Though he had avoided the heavy felony neglect charges that put his mother away, Garrick was facing a mountain of federal civil lawsuits, corporate fraud charges, and a devastating divorce settlement.
Without his mother's domineering guidance and without a single dollar to his name, Garrick’s life had completely unraveled. He was living in a tiny, roach-infested studio apartment on the outskirts of Austin, working sixty hours a week as a nighttime warehouse stocker to pay off his court fines. His luxury cars had been repossessed, his high-society friends had blocked his number, and his name was a national punchline.
One rainy afternoon, six months after the trial, Garrick was summoned to the downtown law offices of Vance-Vanguard Global for the final deposition and signing of our divorce decree.
When Garrick walked into the glass-walled conference room on the 40th floor, he looked twenty years older. His hair was thin and unkempt, his clothes were cheap and ill-fitting, and his eyes were hollowed out by exhaustion and shame.
Sitting across the long marble table were Julian, our legal team, and me.
I was the absolute picture of health and success. My cancer was officially in complete remission, my hair had grown back into beautiful dark waves, and I was dressed in a pristine white designer silk dress.
Garrick stared at me, his lip trembling slightly as he took his seat at the opposite end of the table.
"Audrey..." he whispered, his voice hoarse. "You... you look beautiful."
"Sign the papers, Garrick," Julian said coldly, sliding a thick stack of divorce documents toward him. "We aren't here for small talk."
Garrick picked up the pen with shaking hands, but he didn't sign immediately. He looked up at me with tears brimming in his bloodshot eyes.
"Audrey, please," Garrick begged, his voice cracking. "I lost everything. The house is gone. My mother is in prison. My company went bankrupt. I'm stocking boxes at a warehouse for minimum wage! I have nothing left!"
"You have exactly what you earned, Garrick," I said softly, looking at him without a shred of pity.
"I was stupid!" he sobbed, burying his face in his hands. "I let my mother control me! I should have protected you! I should have loved you! Please... can't you just grant me a small settlement from the trust? Just enough for me to pay off my debts and start over? You have tens of millions now!"
I leaned forward, resting my elbows on the table and looking him straight in the eyes.
"Do you remember what you said to me on the bathroom floor, Garrick?" I asked, my voice as smooth as glass. "When I was sobbing, gasping for air, clutching my bleeding surgical chest?"
Garrick flinched as if he had been slapped.
"You told me I was 'milking it,'" I continued softly. "You kicked my sterile drain bags into the trash. You told me to go out and mow the lawn in 106-degree heat to learn my 'actual duties' as a wife."
"I was wrong!" Garrick wept. "I was an idiot! I'm sorry, Audrey! I'm so sorry!"
"Apologies don't heal surgical scars, Garrick," I said. "And they certainly don't undo psychological torture. You wanted me to work? Well, now you're working. You wanted me to be humble? Now you are living in absolute poverty. You created your own reality."
Julian tapped the paper with his finger. "Sign. Or we proceed to trial on the federal civil racketeering claims, which will carry a mandatory ten-year prison sentence for you as a co-conspirator to wire fraud."
Garrick let out a broken, shuddering gasp. Realizing he had no choice, no leverage, and no hope, he pressed the pen to the paper and signed his name on the dotted line.
He surrendered all rights to any former marital property, waived all claims to alimony, agreed to pay full restitution for the stolen trust funds, and formally signed the divorce decree.
The moment he placed the pen down, Julian pulled the documents away and stamped them with a heavy red corporate seal: EXECUTED.
"We are done here," Julian said, standing up and closing his leather folder. "Security will escort you down the freight elevator, Mr. Vance."
Garrick slowly stood up, looking at me one last time, hoping for even a single nod of forgiveness.
I simply picked up my leather handbag, turned my back on him, and walked toward the floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the city, completely ignoring his existence.
May you like
As the heavy glass doors of the conference room closed behind him, I looked out over Austin, feeling the final, lingering thread of my past relationship snap forever.
The nightmare was officially over. My life was finally my own.
