Chapter 9 - Reclamation
The Vance Global Logistics headquarters was an eighty-story tower of black glass overlooking New York Harbor.
At 8:45 AM the following morning, a line of federal agents and corporate forensic accountants stood outside the front lobby doors. The news vans stretched for three city blocks.
The heavy glass revolving doors turned, and Julianna stepped into the atrium.
She wore a sharp, tailored charcoal pantsuit with a silk ivory blouse, Kenneth Vance’s gold watch gleaming on her left wrist. Dante walked half a step behind her, flanked by his legal team and six of his top lieutenants.
The security guards at the turnstiles—the ones who had worked for her father for twenty years—stood at attention, tears welling in the eyes of the older men. One of them, an old veteran named Thomas, pressed his fist against his chest and bowed his head.
“Welcome home, Miss Vance,” Thomas whispered.
“Thank you, Thomas,” she said, her voice warm. “Have the locks on the 70th floor changed immediately.”
The board meeting lasted less than forty-five minutes.
Julian’s loyalists on the board sat with white knuckles, staring down at the federal subpoenas laid out before them. By 9:30 AM, three board members had resigned. By 9:45 AM, Julian Vance had been formally indicted by the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York on twelve counts of attempted murder, wire fraud, grand larceny, and corporate embezzlement. He was sitting in a federal holding cell in lower Manhattan, denied bail due to extreme flight risk.
Julianna walked into her father’s corner office.
The room had remained largely unchanged, though Julian had hung an ugly, modern portrait of himself behind the mahogany desk. Julianna walked over, took the portrait off the brass hook, and dropped it onto the floor, the glass shattering into a thousand pieces.
She walked behind the desk and looked out the massive windows.
Below lay the harbor. The massive container ships moved slowly through the gray water, their horn blasts low and resonant in the morning fog. The water that had tried to claim her was still there, vast and cold. But it no longer had power over her. She owned the ships that rode upon it.
A hand rested gently on her shoulder.
She didn't flinch. She turned her head and leaned her cheek against Dante’s hand.
“It’s done,” Dante said.
May you like
“It’s only starting,” she replied, turning to face him. “We have to rebuild everything he broke.”
“We will,” Dante said. For the first time since he had found her dragging her heavy hair through that midtown alley, a faint, genuine smile touched his lips. “Together.”
