Chapter 10 - The Fall of the Matriarch
Judge Hall was a sixty-year-old jurist known throughout the state as an unbending pillar of legal propriety. She had personally signed the emergency inspection order three hours ago, and Vance had managed to intercept her during an emergency judicial chambers conference.
Judge Hall walked slowly into the hospital room, her cold grey eyes sweeping from Teresa’s trembling, enraged face to the bandaged arm of my six-year-old daughter cowering beneath the sheets.
“Mr. Sterling,” Judge Hall said, her voice dropping like an anvil onto the floor. “Are you aware that your clients are currently violating an emergency bench order issued under my direct signature forty-five minutes ago?”
Arthur Sterling stepped backward, raising his hands in immediate, desperate surrender. “Your Honor… I was unaware that the bench order had already been entered into the registry. I strongly advised my clients to remain outside—”
“You are lying, Arthur,” Judge Hall cut him off coldly. “And you will answer to the ethics committee for this circus.”
Judge Hall turned to the two deputies.
“Deputies, arrest Teresa Morales immediately for felony violation of an emergency protective order, witness intimidation, and aggravated harassment.”
“No! You can’t do this to me!” Teresa screamed as the deputies grabbed her by the elbows, forcing her hands behind her back. “Diego! Diego, tell them who we are! Tell them!”
Diego didn't speak. He stood frozen, his eyes glued to the floor, sweating through his custom-tailored shirt like a pig awaiting the slaughter.
As the deputies dragged Teresa thrashing and screaming down the corridor, her frantic shrieks echoing through the pediatric ward, Judge Hall looked directly at Diego.
“Mr. Morales, your corporate accounts have been frozen under federal receiver rules. Your sister Elena has just delivered three years of internal accounting ledgers to the United States Attorney’s Office. You are hereby ordered to surrender your passport to the clerk within two hours. If you approach this woman or this child within five hundred yards, I will hold you in summary contempt without bail until your trial begins.”
Diego looked up at me, his eyes wet with pathetic, self-pitying tears. “Verónica… please. Think about what we built. Think about the family.”
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“We didn't build anything, Diego,” I said, looking at him with the utter indifference one reserves for a stranger on a subway platform. “I built an empire. You built a house of cards on top of my back. And today, the wind picked up.”
***
