Chapter 2 - The Audit Unveiled
Drew’s champagne glass slipped from his fingers.
The crystal shattered against the Charleston bluestone patio with a loud, ringing crash that caused several nearby wedding guests to turn their heads. Champagne splattered across the cuffs of his bespoke trousers, but Drew didn't even look down. His jaw hung slack, his skin taking on the sickly gray hue of wet plaster.
"What?" Drew choked out, the word whistling through his teeth. "No. No, that’s impossible. Bennett & Sterling uses an external risk syndicate out of Atlanta. The documentation said Apex Risk Advisory."
"Apex is my firm, Drew," I replied, folding my arms across my chest as a wave of absolute clarity washed over me. "I founded Apex three years ago. We handle third-party forensic verifications for six regional private equity funds in the Southeast. Owen’s firm recuses itself from internal compliance decisions to prevent conflicts of interest. When your portfolio landed on my desk three weeks ago, Owen never even saw the client list. He only knew your name because of the grotesque personal email you sent him six months prior."
Vanessa gasped, dropping her hold on Drew’s arm as if his touch had suddenly burned her. "You told me Apex was run by an old classmate from Dartmouth! You told my father that the lead auditor was an established industry veteran named M. R. Ellis!"
"Maren Rose Ellis," I clarified, looking Vanessa directly in the eyes. "That has been my legal professional name for fifteen years. Drew knew that. He just never believed I was capable of building a premier consulting agency because he spent our entire marriage convincing himself that my career was nothing more than 'spreadsheets and busywork.'"
Drew began sweating profusely, reaching into his pocket for a linen handkerchief that wasn't there. "Maren... listen to me. We need to step aside and talk about this privately. There’s no need to air internal corporate matters at your cousin’s wedding. We’re family, in a way. We have history."
"You don't get to invoke history when it suits your wallet, Drew," I said coldly. "Five minutes ago, you walked up to me, looked me up and down, and raised a glass to tell me that abandoning our marriage was the smartest decision you ever made. You wanted to see me broken. You wanted to see me bitter, struggling, and regretting that I didn't spend my life catering to your ego."
"I was joking!" Drew protested, his voice escalating into a frantic, desperate pitch that drew the attention of my aunt and several cousins across the terrace. "It was cocktail banter! People tease each other at weddings!"
"Cocktail banter doesn't include filing fraudulent equipment depreciations on state harbor leases," Owen interjected, his eyes locking onto Drew with prosecutorial precision.
Drew’s breath hitched in his throat. His knees seemed to buckle slightly beneath his tailored suit.
Vanessa turned on him like a cornered viper. "What equipment depreciations? Drew, my father deposited two million dollars in escrow last Tuesday based on your sworn equipment affidavits! What did you do to that machinery?!"
"Nothing!" Drew yelled, his composure completely disintegrating. "Vanessa, calm down! Don't listen to them! They're colluding against us! Maren is using her husband's fund to settle a personal vendetta against me because I left her for you!"
"I don't hold vendettas against men who gave me my freedom, Drew," I said, looking down at my daughter, who was happily watching a butterfly flutter near the hydrangeas. "Leaving me was indeed the best decision you ever made—for me. It cleared the way for a real partner, a real family, and an honest life. But the audit on your firm isn't personal. It's math. And unlike you, math doesn't lie."
May you like
Owen checked his silver wristwatch with calm, devastating indifference. "The preliminary audit findings were completed at five o'clock yesterday afternoon, Drew. My managing board received the compliance red flags this morning before the ceremony started. The seven-million-dollar facility has already been frozen."
Drew looked at Owen, then at me, realizing for the first time that the golden tower he had spent years fabricating out of lies and borrowed social standing was crumbling into dust right in front of his new fiancee and the very people he had tried to humiliate.
