Chapter 14 - The Final SeveranceThe fallout was catastrophic, immediate, and entirely in my favor.
By the time the sun rose over Chicago the next morning, the media narrative had exploded. Arthur Sterling was denied bail, locked in a federal holding facility. The routing numbers Jason had uncovered provided the FBI with irrefutable proof that Diane Vance had violated her parole by orchestrating a criminal conspiracy.
The illusion of her dementia vanished the second the federal marshals kicked down the door of her luxury rehabilitation estate.
It was a rainy Thursday afternoon. The sky was a bruised, heavy purple.
I stood in the sterile, fluorescent-lit visitation room of the Metropolitan Correctional Center. A thick pane of bulletproof glass separated me from the empty metal chair on the other side.
The heavy steel door clanked open.
A guard escorted Diane into the booth.
For a moment, I simply observed her. The last time I had seen her, she was playing the victim for the cameras. The woman sitting down across from me now was a ghost. The orange prison jumpsuit hung loosely on her frame. Her hair was unkempt, the roots showing stark white against the fading dye. She looked exhausted, frantic, and completely stripped of her venom.
She picked up the heavy black telephone receiver on her side of the glass.
I picked up mine.
“You,” Diane hissed, her voice vibrating with a toxic, impotent rage. “You did this. You planted those documents on Arthur’s servers. You set me up.”
“I didn't have to plant anything, Diane,” I said, my voice a flat, clinical monotone. “You are arrogant. You always leave a paper trail because you believe you are too important to face consequences.”
Diane leaned closer to the glass, her eyes wild.
“I am a Vance!” she spat. “I built this city! I will get out of here. I will hire better lawyers. I will appeal the parole revocation. I will never stop, Maya. I will take Jason back. I will take my grandchildren. I will destroy your pathetic little life.”
I looked at the woman who had terrorized me for years. A woman so utterly consumed by her own ego that she couldn't see the guillotine that had already fallen on her neck.
“You misunderstand the landscape, Diane,” I said softly.
I did not raise my voice. I did not break eye contact.
“I am not here to gloat,” I continued, my words dropping like ice cubes into a glass. “I am here to deliver a message. Your federal trial for wire fraud and conspiracy begins next month. Because you violated your state parole to commit a federal crime, you are facing a mandatory minimum of twenty years. You are never getting out of this cage.”
Diane’s face twitched. The bravado began to crack, replaced by a creeping, suffocating terror.
“Jason knows everything,” I whispered, leaning my face inches from the glass. “He was the one who pulled the routing numbers. He was the one who handed you to the FBI. Your son doesn't love you, Diane. He pities you. And he is never coming to see you again.”
Diane stumbled backward in her chair, clutching the phone receiver as if it were a lifeline. Tears of absolute, crushing defeat finally spilled over her lashes.
“My grandchildren...” she choked out.
“Will not even remember your name,” I promised, my eyes blazing with absolute, matriarchal fury.
May you like
I hung up the receiver. I didn't wait for her to respond. I turned my back on her and walked out of the prison, stepping out into the crisp, rain-washed air of the city.
The cycle of abuse had not just been broken. It had been permanently, violently eradicated.
