Chapter 14 - A Visit Behind Cold Bars
The heavy steel gates of High Desert State Prison clanged shut behind me with a sound of utter finality.
The air inside the visitor's corridor smelled of industrial bleach, stale sweat, and damp concrete.
I was seated behind a partition of reinforced plexiglass in a private interrogation room arranged by the state attorney general.
The opposite door unlocked, and two armed guards escorted Ryan Bennett to the steel stool across from me.
The transformation was shocking.
The handsome, arrogant billionaire who had once strutted through five-star hotels in bespoke Italian suits was gone.
His hair was sheared close to his scalp, streaked with premature gray.
His face was hollow, his skin pale and sickly under the buzzing fluorescent lights.
He wore an orange jumpsuit with his inmate registration number stamped over his chest in black ink.
His wrists were cuffed to a chain wrapped tightly around his waist.
He looked up, his bloodshot eyes widening in disbelief as he saw me sitting on the other side of the glass.
I wore an immaculate cream silk blouse, my makeup flawless, my posture regal.
"Claire," he croaked, his voice raw from disuse.
"You... you came."
"Did you get my letters? The warden said they were delivered."
"I didn't come to read your apologies, Ryan," I said coolly, leaning forward to the small circular speaker.
"I came because your mother is in Las Vegas."
The color instantly drained from Ryan's already pale face.
His hands trembled against the steel tabletop, the chains rattling against the metal.
"Mother?" he whispered, his eyes darting frantically toward the guards as if she might materialize from the shadows.
"She's dead. She died in Zurich."
"Stop lying, Ryan," I said firmly.
"She's very much alive, and she has filed an emergency claim to take everything."
"The hospital land, the downtown towers, every single asset you thought you built."
"She called you an idiot who squandered the family legacy."
"She said you deserved to rot in this cage."
A strange, bitter sound escaped Ryan’s throat—a laugh that sounded closer to a sob.
"She always said that," Ryan muttered, tears welling in his hollow eyes.
"Nothing was ever mine, Claire. Not the money, not the company, not even the house."
"She faked her illness to escape a federal grand jury twelve years ago."
"She handed me the keys to the empire and told me to be the public face."
"She told me if I ever crossed her, she would erase me."
"Why did you think I was so desperate for liquidity when the casino deal collapsed?"
"I was trying to buy my freedom from her trust!"
"Then help me destroy her," I stated, my voice cutting through his panic like a surgical blade.
"Give me what she's hiding, Ryan."
"Give me the leverage she used to control you, or she will strip every asset and leave you here with nothing."
"No appeals, no private legal fund, no commissary, no hope."
Ryan stared at me, seeing the woman he had discarded transformed into an apex predator.
He lowered his head, breathing heavily, wrestling with years of ingrained fear.
Finally, he looked up, his gaze steadying with a dark, vengeful resolve.
"Lake Mead," he whispered hoarsely against the glass.
"The dry dock at the old marina."
"Storage locker 402."
"Under the floorboards of the vintage Chris-Craft boat."
"There is a locked titanium briefcase."
"The key is behind the silver watch she gave me on my wedding day."
"The one you kept in the estate safe."
Ryan leaned as close to the glass as his chains allowed.
"Be careful, Claire," he warned, his voice shaking.
"My mother didn't just launder money."
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"She killed the federal prosecutor who came after her in 2012."
"And she will kill you before she lets that briefcase see the light of day."
