Chapter 8 - The Audit of Souls
Three weeks after Reed’s arrest on the airport tarmac, the dust had begun to settle, revealing the full extent of the financial carnage he left behind.
I returned to Chicago not as a disgraced, accused spouse, but as the newly appointed interim Executive Chairperson of Sterling & Vance Real Estate Development—a company the board quickly voted to rename Valence Commercial Properties to purge the firm of any connection to Reed and Paige.
Walking into the corporate headquarters on my first morning back felt entirely different. The quiet, uncomfortable whispers that had followed me weeks ago were gone, replaced by a profound, respectful silence from the staff. They knew the truth now. They had seen the news reports detailing the federal indictments, the bigamy charges, and the massive corporate fraud scheme.
Sitting in the master executive office—the office that had once belonged to Reed—I looked out at the city skyline. On my desk sat a comprehensive, four-hundred-page forensic audit report prepared by Marcus Thorne’s firm.
Sarah walked in, carrying two hot cups of coffee, and sat across from me.
"The audit is finalized?" Sarah asked, nodding toward the thick document.
"It’s complete," I said, opening the cover. "And it's even worse than we thought."
"How bad?"
"Reed didn't just embezzle funds for the Santa Fe land deal," I explained, turning to the executive summary. "Over the last five years, he had been systematically taking out secondary high-interest corporate loans against our core Chicago property portfolio, forging my authorization signature on board resolutions. He was using the loan proceeds to pay off the interest on the Miami consortium’s dirty capital."
Sarah winced. "Which means our firm is over-leveraged."
"Extremely over-leveraged," I agreed. "If we don't liquidate non-core assets within sixty days, three of our major downtown office towers will go into judicial foreclosure."
"Can we sell the Santa Fe land to cover the debt?" Sarah asked.
I smiled—a slow, confident smile that had taken twelve years of survival to cultivate. "Sell it? No. The Santa Fe land is currently appraised at eighty-five million dollars following the federal government's official announcement of the rail line expansion yesterday."
Sarah’s eyes lit up. "Which means it’s worth twice what Reed paid for it."
"Exactly," I said. "And because the New Mexico Chancery Court officially ruled yesterday that the land conveyance deed was acquired using my stolen marital capital, the court has officially transferred full legal title of the entire eight-thousand-acre Rio Rancho Reserve directly to me."
"You own the land," Sarah breathed.
"I own the land," I nodded. "And instead of selling it off to private developers who want to exploit it, I’ve already entered negotiations with a major green energy consortium and the State of New Mexico to build the state's largest community-owned solar infrastructure project. The initial lease licensing fees alone will inject twenty-five million dollars of clean, unencumbered cash into our Chicago firm within thirty days."
Sarah stared at me for a moment, then burst out laughing with pure, unfiltered joy. "You didn't just save the firm, Laura. You completely transformed it."
Later that afternoon, I received a notification from the Cook County Department of Corrections.
Reed’s criminal defense attorney had submitted a formal request for me to visit Reed in the county jail facility before his transfer to a federal holding center in Indiana. The note indicated that Reed was desperate to sign over any remaining personal claims to property in exchange for me making a favorable victim impact statement at his upcoming sentencing hearing.
I looked at the request for a long time.
"You don't have to go, Laura," Sarah said softly, standing at my office door. "You owe him nothing."
"I know," I said, putting the note in my bag. "But I'm going anyway. Not for him. For me."
An hour later, I sat behind a thick pane of bulletproof glass in the visitor center of the Cook County Jail.
When the heavy metal door opened, Reed stepped into the booth. He was dressed in a faded orange jumpsuit. His hair was cropped short, his skin was pale and sallow under the harsh fluorescent lights, and the smooth, magnetic charisma that had once defined him was completely vanished.
He sat down heavily on the stool and picked up the plastic intercom phone.
I picked up mine.
"Laura," he said, his voice raspy through the electronic speaker. "Thank you for coming."
"I have ten minutes, Reed," I said calmly. "Say whatever you came to say."
Reed swallowed hard, his hands trembling slightly as he clutched the receiver. "My lawyer said... he said you’re finalizing the receivership transition. He said you got full legal title to the Santa Fe land."
"I did," I replied. "The court recognized that every dollar used to purchase it was stolen from me."
"Laura... please," he choked out, tears welling in his eyes. "They're going to give me fifteen years in federal prison. Fifteen years! My life is over! If you speak to the prosecutor... if you tell them that we worked together, that you forgive me, that it was a civil business dispute that got out of hand... they’ll offer me a plea deal for four years!"
I looked at him through the glass. I looked at the man who had shoved me into a marble table, who had hired lawyers to frame me as a violent criminal, who had forged my name, cheated on me, and tried to strip me of my dignity and human worth.
"Do you remember what you said to me in that penthouse, Reed?" I asked, my voice terrifyingly calm.
He blinked, confused. "What?"
"You stood over me while I was bleeding on the floor and told me that I was dangerous, that I was crazy, and that you were going to make sure I went to prison," I reminded him. "You looked at me with absolute contempt and told me I had everything to lose."
Reed lowered his head, a single tear running down his nose. "I was terrified, Laura... I panicked—"
"No, Reed," I interrupted. "You weren't panicked. You were confident that you were smarter than me. You were confident that a woman who loved you would be too weak, too broken, and too frightened to fight back."
I slowly stood up from my stool, holding the phone firmly against my ear.
"I am not going to write a letter to the judge," I said, staring straight into his hollow eyes. "I am going to stand in that courtroom at your sentencing, look the judge in the eye, and ask for the maximum possible sentence allowed by law."
"Laura, please! Don't do this! I loved you!" he begged, slamming his palm against the glass. "I loved you for twelve years!"
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"You never loved me, Reed," I said softly. "You loved what I helped you build. But now, the build is mine."
I hung up the plastic phone, placed it neatly back on its hook, and walked out of the visitor room, leaving his desperate screams echoing behind the heavy steel doors.
