Chapter 5 - Unraveling the Web
By Sunday evening, the house was eerily quiet. Scott had packed his belongings into four large suitcases and checked into a downtown extended-stay hotel, leaving behind a trail of frantic, unanswered voicemails and emails begging Leonora to reconsider.
Instead of listening to his pleas, Leonora spent the weekend dismantling the invisible trap Scott had built around their lives. She called Maya Collins, the seventeen-year-old babysitter, and invited her over. When Maya arrived, looking nervous and clutching her backpack, Leonora didn't blame her for what had happened.
"Maya, I know Scott lied to you and told you I approved the cancellations," Leonora said gently, sitting across from her at the kitchen island with two cups of hot cocoa. "I want you to know that you did nothing wrong. But I am hiring you for every Thursday and Saturday moving forward, at double your holiday rate, with a formal contract signed by me directly."
Maya’s eyes widened with relief. "Mrs. Grant... are you and Mr. Grant...?"
"We are separating," Leonora answered honestly. "And going forward, nobody is ever going to put responsibilities on my children that don't belong to them."
With the immediate domestic crisis stabilized, Leonora turned her attention to the broader financial picture. With Sarah Vance’s help, forensic accountants began auditing Whitmore Capital’s corporate accounts and personal expenditures. What they uncovered went far beyond an office romance with Brooke Ellis.
May you like
Scott had been systematically redirecting corporate subsidiary funds into private, offshore accounts registered under shell companies—the very same financial maneuvers Julian Vance had used in the Philadelphia syndicate case, though on a corporate scale. Scott was attempting to siphon marital assets out of reach before filing for bankruptcy protection in case his corporate board discovered his mismanagement of regional accounts.
It wasn't just a messy marital affair; it was an impending corporate scandal. And Scott had underestimated his wife's intelligence at every single turn.
