Chapter 8
Anthony did not defend Laurel blindly.
She noticed.
It hurt.
It also mattered.
“Verify them.”
The forensic specialist took the printouts.
Victor smirked.
“What happens if they're real?”
Anthony looked at him.
“The truth happens.”
Laurel’s eyes stayed on her husband.
His voice remained calm, but she saw tension in his hand.
The same hand that had held hers through Mia’s birth.
Now resting flat against a table while strangers examined whether she had secretly conspired against his aunt.
Laurel looked away first.
The forensic report took an hour.
The messages had indeed originated from Laurel’s account.
Her real phone.
Her real device token.
Marcia looked vindicated.
“I knew it.”
Laurel shook her head.
“No.”
Victor laughed.
“You keep saying no to things your devices keep doing.”
Anthony watched Laurel.
She pressed two fingers to her temple.
Then froze.
“Mia’s hospital night.”
Anthony frowned.
“What?”
“Eight months ago.”
Mia had developed a high fever.
Anthony was out of state.
Laurel spent the night at Lenox Hill with their daughter.
Victor had arrived to help.
He carried bags.
Chargers.
Her phone.
At one point Laurel slept for two hours.
When she woke, Victor had already left.
She looked at him.
“You had my phone.”
Victor smiled.
“So?”
“You knew the passcode.”
“You gave it to me.”
“To call Anthony.”
Marcia’s expression changed.
Victor’s jaw tightened slightly.
Forensics examined account-access history.
A new forwarding rule had been created that night.
Buried deep in Laurel’s email settings.
Copies of selected messages went to an outside account.
Worse—
her account could be accessed through a trusted-device session without generating a fresh login alert.
Victor looked toward the door.
Bodyguards shifted.
Anthony saw it.
“Sit.”
Victor did.
Laurel stared at him.
“You read my private mail for eight months.”
Victor said nothing.
“And sent messages from my account.”
“Prove it.”
The specialist did not have to.
Not yet.
But the possibility was now real.
Then the accountant approached Anthony.
“The cash used for tonight’s envelopes has been traced.”
Victor’s eyes narrowed.
Anthony looked at the report.
The withdrawals did not come from Victor’s company.
They came from a discretionary family account.
Authorized by—
Marcia.
Marcia went white.
“No.”
Victor leaned back.
“There it is.”
She stared at the signatures.
“They're mine.”
Anthony’s eyes lifted.
“Then you paid them?”
“No.”
Marcia’s hand began shaking.
“I signed blank disbursement approvals for support payments.”
Victor looked toward her.
Too late.
She understood.
The cash.
The watch transfers.
The paper trail.
Her signatures.
Laurel’s hacked account.
Everything pointed toward two women.
Marcia and Laurel.
May you like
Victor had positioned himself between them.
And for the first time, Marcia understood that the public humiliation she had staged might have been part of somebody else’s plan.
