Chapter 2 - The Tables Turn
The heavy oak door of the master suite burst open without a knock. Carter stood there, his face pale, his hair disheveled, panting as if he had just sprinted uphill through a hurricane. All the arrogant bluster from downstairs had completely evaporated, replaced by the frantic, wide-eyed terror of a man realizing he had just jumped out of an airplane without a parachute.
"Evelyn," Carter stammered, taking a tentative step forward, his hands raised in a pathetic, placating gesture. "Evelyn, honey, please. Let's just... let's talk about this. What are you doing? My phone is locked out. The corporate accounts—they're frozen! The board of directors is calling me saying our primary funding has been pulled! Is this... did you do this?"
I didn't look up from the tablet where I was reviewing the asset transfer documents. "Sit down, Carter," I said, my voice dangerously calm, devoid of any warmth or emotional inflection.
He swallowed hard, looking desperately at my bruised face, suddenly remembering the fist he had driven into it just an hour prior. A flicker of deep-seated dread crossed his features. "Babe... look, mom was out of line. We were stressed, okay? The company crisis, the debt collectors calling us day and night... we snapped. But we're a married couple! You can't just cut off the funding. You saved the company today, right? You told us you secured the lifeline! If you pull the plug now, everything goes under. I go bankrupt, the house gets repossessed—wait." He stopped dead in his tracks, his eyes darting around the luxurious bedroom. "What did you just say about the house?"
At that exact moment, Beatrice pushed her way past him into the room, her face flushed with indignant fury. "Evelyn! Have you lost your absolute mind? Some men in suits just marched through the front gates and told us we have thirty minutes to pack our designer bags and get out! They threw my vintage furs onto the wet grass! Call them off right now, or I swear I will make your life a living hell!"
I slowly set the tablet down on the marble desk and stood up. I may have been shorter than both of them, but in that moment, the sheer weight of my authority filled the entire room. I walked over to the floor-to-ceiling mirror, turning my face slightly so they could both clearly see the purple bruise marring my skin.
"Make my life a living hell?" I repeated softly, turning my gaze back to my mother-in-law. "Beatrice, you called me a streetwalker. You yanked me by the hair and threw me onto the marble floor like an animal. And you," I pointed a sharp, steady finger at Carter, "stood by and punched me in the face. You thought you could beat the signature out of me. You thought I was your dependent, your punching bag, your personal ATM."
"It was a misunderstanding!" Beatrice screeched, her voice pitching up in panic as the distant sound of heavy boxes being loaded into trucks echoed from the foyer below. "A husband and wife dispute! You provoked us by coming home in the middle of the night looking like a tramp!"
"Check your email, Carter," I instructed, ignoring the old woman's screeching.
Carter fumbling with his phone, his trembling fingers finally unlocking the screen. He tapped his email app, his eyes scanning the urgent legal notification sent from my personal corporate counsel. As he read, his knees visibly buckled. He grabbed onto the edge of the dresser to keep from collapsing, his breath hitching in his throat.
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"This... this is impossible," Carter whispered, staring at me as if looking at a ghost. "You... you own the building? You own the venture capital fund that backs my company? The entire startup... it's subsidiary to your personal holding trust?"
"You didn't think I built a multi-million-dollar portfolio by being a trophy wife, did you?" I smiled coldly. "Every single client you've ever closed, every single server your startup runs on, every square foot of this estate—it all belongs to Evelyn Vance Holdings. And as of twelve minutes ago, Carter, you are officially fired as CEO, evicted from the premises, and stripped of every single cent I ever allowed you to touch."
