MY HUSBAND TOLD ME TO GO HOME, HIS MISTRESS LAUGHED, AND 200 PEOPLE PRETENDED NOT TO SEE HIM HUMILIATE ME. HE THOUGHT HE WAS TEN MINUTES AWAY FROM THE BIGGEST PROMOTION OF HIS LIFE. I KNEW BETTER. I HAD SIGNED THE OWNERSHIP DOCUMENTS THAT AFTERNOON, AND THE CHAIRMAN WAS READY TO MAKE THE ANNOUNCEMENT. BUT WHEN I SAW THE FORENSIC ACCOUNTANT’S BLACK FOLDER, I REALIZED THAT TAKING CONTROL OF THE COMPANY MIGHT BE ONLY THE BEGINNING OF WHAT MY HUSBAND WOULD HAVE TO ANSWER FOR

By Friday afternoon, Vanguard Global Partners had signed the unconditional release of all claims against Aurelia Systems, fleeing back to Zurich to deal with their own SEC compliance audits.

The company was finally, completely secure. But there was one final loose end I needed to knot with my own hands.

At 2:00 PM, a sleek black town car pulled up to the heavy iron gates of MCI Cedar Junction—the maximum-security state correctional facility in Walpole, Massachusetts.

I stepped out of the vehicle wearing a simple dark wool coat and sunglasses.

I didn't enter the facility as a victim, nor as a grieving spouse. I walked into the sterile, windowless visitor room as the Chief Executive Officer of Aurelia Systems.

A minute later, the heavy iron door opened.

Julian was led into the room by a armed guard. He looked withered. Eight months of prison life had stripped away his fake tan, his executive posture, and his golden hair, leaving a thin, graying man with hollow cheeks and trembling hands.

He sat down on the metal stool across the thick glass divider, picking up the plastic telephone receiver with shaking fingers.

I picked up mine.

"Audrey..." Julian rasped through the speaker. His voice was cracked, devoid of its former booming thunder. "You came... I didn't think you'd ever come see me."

"I didn't come to see you, Julian," I said calmly. "I came to deliver a message."

Julian pressed his forehead against the cold glass. "Audrey, please... I heard about Vanguard Global. I’m sorry... I set that up years ago as an insurance policy. I was desperate..."

"Vanguard surrendered the note two hours ago," I interrupted softly. "Aurelia now holds total, unencumbered ownership of every patent, every line of code, and every international distribution right ever created under its name."

Julian stared at me through the glass, his eyes bloodshot, filled with a pathetic, hollow regret.

"How is she?" Julian whimpered. "How is Camilla?"

"Camilla is working as a night-shift clerk at a retail warehouse in Scranton, Pennsylvania," I said flatly. "She pays fifty percent of her wages into the state victim restitution fund. She doesn't answer your letters, Julian."

Julian buried his face in his hand, a ragged, choking sob escaping his throat. "I lost everything... I have seven more years in this place, Audrey... seven years..."

I looked at him through the glass, feeling no anger, no hatred, and no lingering pain. The man who had struck my shoulder at the Halcyon Hotel was gone, replaced by a ghost serving time for his own vanity.

"You didn't lose everything, Julian," I said, my voice cold and steady. "You threw it away. Don't ever write to my office again."