CHAPTER 1: LET HIM BELIEVE HE WON
“What am I supposed to do?”
Harrison leaned back in his chair, studying his sister carefully.
“You’re going to let Richard believe he still controls you.”
Khloe stared at him.
“I don’t understand.”
“You will return to the house. You will smile when he lies. You will pretend you know nothing about Vanessa, the offshore accounts, or his plan to leave you.”
Khloe’s hand tightened over her stomach.
“And while I’m pretending?”
“I’ll dismantle him.”
Harrison turned his computer toward her. On the screen was a list of corporations she had never seen before. Kensington Design Holdings. Blue Harbor Capital. RHH Management International. Twelve companies, all connected by hidden transfers.
“Richard didn’t simply hide marital assets,” Harrison explained. “He moved investor money through your joint accounts. He used your electronic signature on loan guarantees. If these documents are genuine, he has made you look like an accomplice.”
Khloe felt the room tilt.
“I never signed any of those.”
“I know.”
“Will a court know?”
“That depends on whether Richard realizes we have them.”
Harrison opened a locked drawer and removed a small black device.
“This will make encrypted copies of everything connected to your home network. Emails. Contracts. Security footage. Deleted files. You plug it into the router and leave it there for twenty minutes.”
“That sounds illegal.”
“It would be if the network didn’t belong to you too.”
Khloe looked at her brother’s expression. There was no anger in it. That frightened her more than shouting would have.
“What happens after you get the evidence?”
“I file for emergency protection. We freeze the accounts, block the property transfers, and force him into court before he can finish his exit plan.”
“And Vanessa?”
Harrison’s eyes hardened.
“She becomes useful.”
Khloe returned to the Lower Merion estate shortly after midnight. Richard was asleep in the master bedroom, his phone glowing on the nightstand.
She stood in the doorway and watched the man she had loved for six years breathe peacefully beneath Egyptian cotton sheets.
Then she walked downstairs, found the router inside Richard’s private office, and connected Harrison’s device.
A tiny blue light began blinking.
Nineteen minutes later, footsteps sounded in the hallway.
Khloe froze.
The office door slowly opened.
May you like
Richard stood there, staring at her.
“What are you doing in my office?”
