Chapter 8
"Get your hands off my son!" Elaine screamed, pointing a shaking, manicured finger across the table. "You psychotic bitch! You ruined our family's name! You come in here with your street trash—"
"Street trash?" Maya interrupted, her tone devoid of anger, which made it ten times more horrifying.
She tapped the leather chair once. Frank stepped forward and dropped a thick, leather-bound audit file onto the mahogany table directly in front of Arthur. The heavy binder landed with a loud, final thud that made the crystal water glasses ring.
"Open it, Arthur," Maya said calmly.
Arthur glared at her, his jaw trembling with rage, but his curiosity won out. With unsteady fingers, the patriarch flipped open the binder.
His eyes scanned the first page. Then the second. The color drained from his weathered face so fast he seemed to age ten years in five seconds.
"What is this?" Arthur rasped, his voice losing its thunderous boom.
"That is the forensic audit of Whitaker Enterprises' commercial paper," Maya explained, walking slowly around the table toward him. "For ten years, you believed your firm was being subsidized by private venture capital from Zurich. You thought you were brilliant. You thought your real estate acquisitions were funded by European banking elites."
Maya stopped three feet from Arthur's chair, leaning down until her cold grey eyes were level with his.
"The Zurich consortium is a shell company owned entirely by my family's foundation, Arthur," Maya whispered, every syllable dropping like lead into the frozen room. "Every loan you took out, every bond you issued, every mortgage on this building and your estate in Greenwich was purchased by my father thirty years ago. I didn't marry your son for your prestige. I married him because my accountants told me it was easier to manage our toxic assets from the inside."
Andrew shot up from his chair, his eyes bulging in sheer panic. "What?! Maya, that's impossible! You were an art history student when I met you!"
"I was managing forty million dollars in international freight before I turned twenty-two, Andrew," Maya said, not even glancing in his direction. "You were struggling to pass your corporate finance exams while drinking your father's scotch."
Elaine scrambled out of her seat, clutching her husband's arm. "Arthur! Tell her she's lying! She's trying to intimidate us!"
May you like
"She isn't lying," Arthur whispered, his hands trembling violently as he closed the file. "The holding numbers... the routing codes... they match our primary debt facility. Good God... she holds our entire credit line."
"Thirty minutes ago, my bankers executed the default clauses," Maya said, checking her diamond wristwatch with casual indifference. "Whitaker Enterprises is officially in technical bankruptcy. Your accounts are frozen. The Greenwich estate is under administrative seizure. And your private jet in Teterboro is currently being locked down by port authority agents who report directly to Frank."
