Chapter 9 - The Vengeful Alliance
Inside the cold,
sterile visitation room of the county detention facility,
Victoria sat behind a thick sheet of bulletproof glass.
She was dressed in a rough,
orange inmate jumpsuit,
her unwashed hair hanging limply around her pale face.
Her manicured nails were chipped,
and her eyes burned with an unhinged,
furious desperation.
On the other side of the glass sat her brother,
Julian Vance,
a tall,
sharply dressed man with cold,
calculating gray eyes and a cruel smile.
Julian picked up the black plastic telephone receiver,
watching his sister with a mix of pity and annoyance.
Victoria grabbed her receiver with trembling hands,
pressing it tight against her ear.
Victoria: Julian!
You have to get me out of this disgusting place immediately!
The food is inedible,
the guards are barbaric,
and I am trapped in a tiny cell with common criminals!
Do something!
Julian: Keep your voice down,
Victoria,
the guards are watching every movement through the mirror.
I have already hired Marcus Thorne to handle your legal defense,
and he is working on an emergency bail motion as we speak.
However,
the judge locked you up without bail because of the security video evidence.
Victoria pounded her fist against the thick glass,
her voice rising to a frantic shriek.
Victoria: That wretched maid ruined everything!
She jumped out of nowhere and caught the little brat!
If she had not interfered,
Leo would have fallen,
and it would have looked like a tragic,
unfortunate accident!
Now Richard knows everything,
and his lawyers are freezing all our accounts!
Julian leaned in closer to the glass,
his eyes narrowing into two thin slits of dark intention.
Julian: Calm down and listen to me carefully,
sister.
Panicking will get you twenty years in a maximum-security prison.
Thorne is going to attack the validity of that camera footage in court,
claiming it was tampered with by the house staff.
But a video alone is easy for expert witnesses to argue over.
The real threat to us is Sarah's direct eye-witness testimony.
If she stands in front of a jury and describes what she saw,
the jury will believe her,
and you will spend the rest of your youth behind iron bars.
Victoria sneered bitterly through the glass,
her knuckles white around the telephone handset.
Victoria: Then make sure she never reaches that witness stand,
Julian!
I do not care how you do it,
or how much it costs!
Use the money we transferred to the offshore account!
Pay whoever you need to pay,
ruin her reputation,
threaten her family,
or make her disappear permanently!
Julian smiled a slow,
sinister smile,
adjusting his gold cuff links with smooth grace.
Julian: Do not worry,
my dear sister.
I have already hired a team of private operatives who specialize in discrete,
untraceable solutions.
They are already monitoring the maid's daily routines outside the Davis estate.
She takes her day off every Thursday to visit her elderly mother in the old district.
That district is quiet,
dark,
and full of blind alleys with no security cameras.
Victoria's eyes gleamed with malicious satisfaction as she listened to her brother's cold,
calculating strategy.
Victoria: Good.
Make sure she suffers,
Julian.
Make her regret the day she ever raised her hand against me in that foyer.
Julian: Consider it taken care of,
Victoria.
By this time next week,
the maid will either be discredited beyond repair,
or she will be in no position to speak a single word in a court of law.
He hung up the telephone receiver with a soft,
final click,
stood up from his chair,
May you like
and walked out of the visitation room,
leaving his sister sitting alone in the cold shadow of her prison cell.
