Chapter 4 - Three Screens, One Nightmare
When I stepped back into the private dining room, the atmosphere had shifted perceptibly. Dessert was being served—a delicate raspberry tart that looked untouched on every plate.
Heloise noticed my return and smirked, assuming I had retreated to nurse my wounded pride in the powder room.
“Ah, back from refreshing yourself?” she remarked, raising her champagne flute. “Good. We were just discussing the guest list for the rehearsal dinner. Naturally, seating will be restricted to immediate family and close associates who understand proper etiquette.”
I didn’t answer her. I walked straight to my seat, but instead of sitting down, I placed the heavy black leather folder squarely in the center of the table, right on top of the cream-colored Social Boundaries Agreement Heloise had so proudly authored.
The sound of the leather hitting the polished wood was small, but it commanded immediate silence.
Alec’s head snapped up. The moment his eyes locked onto the black folder with the embossed Stonebridge Group insignia stamped in silver in the corner, all the color drained completely from his face. He looked like he had just swallowed a handful of dry ash.
“What... what is that?” Alec stammered, his voice pitching an octave higher than normal.
Bridget frowned, looking between her brother and me with sudden annoyance. “Mom, what is she doing now? Why is she bringing trash to the table?”
“It’s not trash, Bridget,” I said, my voice carrying a quiet, razor-sharp edge that cut through the room like a scalpel. “In fact, it’s worth about four million dollars. Or, more accurately, it’s proof of where four million dollars of corporate capital mysteriously vanished over the last fourteen months.”
Heloise’s smile faltered, her painted lips parting in an expression of haughty disbelief. “Excuse me? Are you entirely out of your mind? How dare you bring your pathetic little financial grievances into a family celebration—?”
“Mother, shut up!” Alec suddenly screamed, leaping to his feet so violently his chair tipped backward and crashed loudly against the marble floor.
The entire restaurant staff froze. Across the room, diners at neighboring tables turned to stare at our section.
Nina looked up at her fiancé in absolute horror, her eyes wide and trembling. “Alec? What is he talking about? What is that file?”
Before Alec could choke out a lie, three distinct electronic chimes rang out simultaneously across the table.
Ping. Ping. Ping.
Bridget’s phone lit up with a harsh, glaring white light against the dark tablecloth.
Alec’s phone vibrated violently against the wood, sliding an inch from the force of the alert.
And Heloise’s phone—resting right beside her wineglass—flashed with an urgent corporate security notification.
Three screens. Three notifications. Three distinct corporate terminals registering an emergency priority alert from Meridian Capital’s executive compliance division.
Bridget reached down with shaking fingers and unlocked her phone. Her eyes raced across the text preview of the internal security memo. As she read the words “EMERGENCY AUDIT: FRAUD INVESTIGATION AND ASSET FREEZE,” her mouth dropped open in a silent, horrified scream.
Heloise slowly picked up her phone, her fingers trembling so badly she nearly dropped the device into her soup bowl. She read the first line of the attached PDF summary, and the arrogant, untouchable matriarch of the Wentworth family suddenly looked like an old, fragile woman staring into the abyss of absolute ruin.
“This... this is a mistake,” Heloise whispered, her voice cracking as she looked up at me. The superiority in her eyes was completely gone, replaced by a cold, crawling terror. “This must be a forgery. Alec is a senior director... he’s untouchable... our family connections—”
“Your connections don’t mean a damn thing when the holding company decides to pull the plug,” I said, leaning forward, resting both hands flat on the table, framing the black folder between us.
I turned my gaze slowly to Alec, who was now sweating profusely, backing away from the table until his spine hit the mahogany sideboard.
“You thought you could loot subsidiary accounts to pay off your margin calls, hide behind your mother’s social status, and then marry my sister so you could use her clean credit record to shield your next round of offshore transfers,” I said, every word dropping like a lead weight into the silence. “You thought Nina was an easy mark—a quiet little teacher from a family you could look down on, bully, and discard.”
Nina slowly stood up from her chair. She looked at Alec, her face completely pale, the illusion of the fairytale romance shattering into a million jagged pieces around her feet.
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“Alec,” Nina said, her voice terrifyingly quiet. “Is it true?”
He couldn’t even look her in the eye. He looked at the floor, his chest heaving, trapped in a cage of his own making.
