Chapter 2 - The Weight of Worthless Paper
The room erupted into absolute chaos,
a beautiful symphony of destruction,
as Victor's mother threw herself at Melissa.
"You parasite!" the old woman screamed,
clawing at the designer clothes,
the very clothes my husband had paid for.
Melissa shoved her away,
backing into a corner,
grabbing her twelve-year-old son by the shoulders.
The boy looked terrified,
confused,
completely unaware that he was the center of a decade-long fraud.
Mr. Sterling took a step toward the door,
ready to flee,
but I stepped directly into his path.
"Not so fast,
Richard," I said,
using his first name,
my voice dripping with ice.
"You haven't heard the best part yet."
Victor was convulsing slightly,
his hands gripping the bedsheets,
his eyes locked on me in sheer,
unadulterated terror.
"Those eight properties," I continued,
turning my attention back to the dying man,
"the ones you just signed over so proudly."
I took a sip of my cold tea,
savoring the bitter taste,
feeling a wave of absolute power wash over me.
"You thought you were leaving them set for life,
didn't you?"
Victor nodded weakly,
a tear finally escaping his eye,
rolling down his sunken cheek.
"Well,
you see,
I found out about those properties ten years ago."
I walked closer,
leaning down until my lips were inches from his ear.
"And over the last decade,
using the power of attorney you blindly signed during your first surgery,
I took out massive,
high-interest loans against every single one of them."
Victor's eyes bulged,
the monitor screaming a continuous,
high-pitched wail.
"They are underwater,
Victor."
I laughed softly,
a sound that seemed to shatter the sterile hospital air.
"They are leveraged to the hilt,
worth absolutely nothing,
and attached to millions of dollars in corporate debt."
Melissa let out a wail of despair,
realizing exactly what had just happened.
"By signing those papers," I said,
my voice echoing in the silent gaps of the alarm,
"you didn't just give them nothing,
you just transferred over ten million dollars of toxic debt directly into Melissa's name."
Mr. Sterling gasped,
realizing his own liability,
realizing he had just facilitated the financial ruin of his own mistress.
"She is bankrupt,
Victor," I whispered,
stroking his sweaty forehead.
"She will lose the cars,
she will lose the house,
and she will spend the rest of her life paying off loans that I took out."
And the best part,
May you like
the absolute cherry on top,
was what I had done with that loan money.
