Chapter 9 - Judgment Day
Garrett didn't know about his mother’s arrest.
He was standing in the shadows of the service alley behind the Park Avenue duplex, the collar of his dirty trench coat pulled up over his unshaven jaw. His hands were shaking from nicotine withdrawal, caffeine, and pure, unadulterated terror.
He waited until the building’s service delivery truck pulled out, slipped through the open loading dock doors, and crept into the private service elevator.
He pulled out the physical keycard he had kept hidden in his watch. He inserted it into the elevator slot.
The light flashed green.
The elevator hummed to life, ascending twenty-eight floors directly into the private foyer of the penthouse.
Garrett’s heart hammered against his ribs like a sledgehammer. In his coat pocket, his fingers wrapped around a heavy, brass decorative paperweight he had taken from his Queens motel room. He didn't want to kill her—he wasn't a murderer, he told himself—he just wanted to terrify her. He wanted her to sit at that dining table, sign the trust revocations, call off the DA, and restore his life.
*Ding.*
The elevator doors slid open with a soft, velvet sigh.
Garrett stepped out onto the polished marble foyer. The penthouse was dimly lit, the floor-to-ceiling windows showing the vast, glittering expanse of Manhattan beneath a stormy night sky.
“Claire!” Garrett shouted, his voice echoing off the vaulted ceilings, wild and unhinged. “Claire, I know you’re in here! Come out and face me!”
He walked into the massive living room.
Sitting in the center of the oversized sofa was me.
I wasn't trembling. I wasn't hiding. I was wearing an elegant, midnight-blue silk dress, my hair pulled back into a sleek, perfect bun, sipping a cup of chamomile tea.
“Hello, Garrett,” I said softly.
“You...” Garrett breathed, stumbling forward, his eyes bloodshot, his trench coat covered in city grime. “You ruined everything. My company. My mother. My name. You turned the whole world against me!”
“You did that yourself, Garrett,” I said, not even setting my tea down. “When you decided that my loyalty was a weakness to be exploited.”
Garrett pulled the heavy brass paperweight from his pocket, raising it as he crossed the room toward me. “Sign the papers, Claire! Call your lawyers right now and drop the fraud charges, or I swear to God, you won't leave this room alive!”
I didn't move an inch. I didn't even blink.
“Look up at the ceiling, Garrett,” I said calmly.
Garrett stopped three feet from me, his arm trembling in the air.
He slowly glanced up.
From the shadows of the mezzanine balcony above, and from the arched doorways leading to the kitchen and master hallway, four heavily armed tactical officers from the NYPD’s Special Operations Division stepped into the light, their rifles aimed squarely at his chest. Red laser dots danced across his dirty trench coat.
“Drop the weapon! Drop it right now! Hands on your head!” a thunderous voice boomed across the room.
Garrett froze. The brass paperweight slipped from his paralyzed fingers, hitting the thick wool rug with a dull, heavy thud.
Behind the sofa, Detective Rodriguez from the Manhattan DA’s office stepped forward, holding a tablet displaying the decrypted files from Elena Rossi’s black hard drive.
“Garrett Vance,” Rodriguez said, his voice flat and merciless. “In addition to the assault and violation of a protection order, you are under arrest for grand larceny in the first degree, fourteen counts of bank fraud, criminal possession of a forged instrument, and aggravated stalking.”
Garrett fell to his knees, his hands locked behind his head, his face pressed against the cold marble floor as two officers pinned his arms and secured the heavy steel cuffs around his wrists.
He looked up at me from the ground, tears of total defeat finally leaking from his bloodshot eyes.
“Claire... please,” he wept, choking on his own saliva. “We were husband and wife. Five years. Doesn't five years mean anything to you?”
I stood up, walked slowly over to where he lay pinned against the floor, and looked down at him with an expression of quiet, absolute peace.
“Five years meant everything to me, Garrett,” I said softly. “Until I realized you were only measuring them in dollars and cents.”
May you like
I turned to Detective Rodriguez. “Take him out of my home.”
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