Chapter 5 - Deposition and Desperation
The conference room on the forty-second floor of the Sterling, Vance & Montgomery tower in downtown Richmond commanded a breathtaking, panoramic view of the James River.
The room was clad in dark mahogany and brushed steel, smelling of expensive leather, polished glass, and cold institutional power. At the head of the twenty-seat quartz conference table sat Arthur Sterling, flanked by three junior litigation partners and two forensic accountants whose laptops were open to dense, color-coded financial spreadsheets.
Across from them sat Derek Halston and his newly retained divorce attorney, Frank Geller.
Geller was a pugnacious, strip-mall family lawyer whom Derek had hired with the last ten thousand dollars scraped together from Evelyn pawning her remaining diamond jewelry. Geller reeked of cheap cologne and desperation, his tie slightly crooked as he adjusted a towering stack of court motions.
Beside him, Derek looked like a ghost of the man who had swaggered through charity galas six days ago. He wore a cheap off-the-rack navy suit that hung loosely from his frame; he had lost ten pounds in less than a week. Dark, purple hollows circled his bloodshot eyes, and his hands trembled slightly as he clutched a paper cup of water.
The heavy double doors of the conference room swung open.
Every person at the table stood up—except Derek, who seemed physically incapable of moving.
Audrey Vance walked into the room.
If Derek had harbored any pathetic, desperate fantasy that Audrey would arrive looking frail, heartbroken, or repentant, that fantasy was incinerated in a single second.
Audrey looked radiant. She was dressed in an impeccably tailored ivory wool trench coat over a high-neck emerald silk blouse and tailored trousers. Her dark hair fell in soft, lustrous waves past her shoulders; her face was luminous with health, and her gray eyes possessed a clarity and serene power that dominated the entire room. She walked with an effortless, graceful confidence, showing no trace of the physical pain she had endured six days earlier.
She did not look at Derek. She did not acknowledge his existence by so much as a glance.
She took her seat at the center of the table, smoothly removing her leather gloves. Arthur Sterling sat down beside her, opening a pristine leather portfolio.
Frank Geller cleared his throat loudly, trying to assert a dominance he clearly did not possess.
“Alright, let’s get this on the record,” Geller said, leaning forward aggressively. “We are here for the preliminary emergency deposition in the matter of *Halston v. Halston*. My client, Mr. Derek Halston, is filing for temporary emergency spousal support, fifty percent equitable distribution of the primary residence known as Riverstone Manor, fifty percent division of all marital appreciation of the Vance Trust assets, and immediate joint physical custody of the infant child, Maisie Vance Halston.”
Arthur Sterling didn't even look up from his papers. “Are you finished, Mr. Geller?”
“No, I am not finished!” Geller barked. “Mrs. Halston has engaged in an egregious, malicious campaign of economic domestic abuse! She has weaponized corporate debt to unlawfully seize my client’s business, evicted him without standard thirty-day tenant protections, alienated him from his newborn daughter, and left him literally destitute! We are prepared to take this to trial and expose this vindictive heiress to every media outlet in the country!”
Audrey listened to the tirade with a calm, faintly amused expression. When Geller finally stopped to breathe, Audrey turned her gaze to Derek.
Derek flinched, shrinking back into his chair beneath the weight of her eyes.
“Derek,” Audrey spoke, her voice musical and entirely devoid of anger. “Do you remember when we were married six years ago at the chapel in Charlottesville?”
Derek blinked, swallowed hard, and nodded weakly. “Yes… yes, of course I do, Audrey.”
“Do you remember what you whispered to me right before we walked into the reception?”
Derek’s eyes darted nervously toward his lawyer. “I… I said you were the most beautiful woman in the world.”
“No,” Audrey said gently. “You whispered: *‘Thank God your father made you sign that prenup. Now everyone will know I married you for love, not for your money.’*”
Derek turned a sickly shade of gray.
Arthur Sterling slid a thick, bound document across the quartz table, coming to a halt directly in front of Frank Geller.
“Exhibit A,” Arthur announced crisply. “The prenuptial agreement drafted by Derek Halston’s own legal team in June of 2018. Signed, notarized, and registered. Paragraph fourteen, subsection C: *‘In the event of dissolution of marriage, Derek Halston waives all rights, claims, titles, and equitable interests in any asset, business entity, real property, or trust fund owned directly or indirectly by Audrey Vance prior to or during the marriage.’*”
Geller waved a hand dismissively. “That prenup was signed before the massive appreciation of the corporate assets! We are claiming marital commingling!”
“There is no commingling,” Arthur countered smoothly, sliding a second folder forward. “Exhibit B. The complete forensic financial trail of Halston Logistics. Over the course of six years, Halston Logistics generated a net operational loss of four point two million dollars. The company only survived because Apex Capital Holdings injected twenty-seven million dollars of Vance Trust capital. Not a single dollar of marital funds was generated by your client. In fact, Mr. Halston personally embezzled one point eight million dollars of corporate mezzanine loan funds between January and September of this year.”
Arthur tapped a tablet screen, projecting a document onto the massive wall monitor behind them.
It was an itemized list of credit card statements, accompanied by high-resolution photographs and receipts.
“On October twelfth,” Arthur read aloud with surgical precision, “while Mrs. Halston was thirty-four weeks pregnant and placed on strict bed rest due to preeclampsia, Mr. Halston spent forty-two thousand dollars at Cartier in New York purchasing a diamond tennis bracelet. We have security footage of Miss Sienna Campbell wearing that exact bracelet at the Commonwealth Club three days ago.”
Derek’s breathing turned shallow and rapid.
“On October twenty-third,” Arthur continued, switching to the next slide, “the night Mrs. Halston went into spontaneous labor and suffered fetal distress requiring an emergency cesarean section, Mr. Halston’s corporate card was charged at the Jefferson Hotel in Richmond: two thousand four hundred dollars for the presidential suite, and eight hundred dollars for vintage champagne.”
Arthur turned off the monitor and looked directly at Frank Geller.
“While his wife was bleeding on an operating table and his daughter’s heart rate had dropped to sixty beats per minute, Mr. Halston was actively engaged in an adulterous liaison sixty blocks away, ignoring seventeen consecutive emergency calls from the hospital obstetrician.”
Geller’s mouth opened, but no words came out. He looked down at his client. Derek was staring at the table, his forehead resting against the quartz, his shoulders shaking in silent, humiliated defeat.
“Under the moral turpitude and abandonment clauses of the Commonwealth family code,” Arthur said, closing his folio, “Mr. Halston is entitled to zero spousal support. Zero equitable distribution. And regarding custody…”
Audrey leaned forward, resting her forearms lightly on the table. When she spoke, the temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees.
“Derek,” Audrey whispered. “You threw your duffel bag onto my daughter’s crib so you could sleep with another woman. You didn't care if she lived or died on Wednesday night. You will never, as long as you draw breath on this earth, have unsupervised access to Maisie. You will sign full legal and physical custody over to me today.”
“And if he doesn't?” Geller squeaked, his aggressive bravado completely gone.
Arthur Sterling leaned back in his chair, smiling like a shark in deep water.
“If he doesn't sign today, the forensic audit of his corporate embezzlement will be delivered to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia by four o’clock this afternoon. Embezzlement from a federally regulated commercial carrier carries a statutory mandatory minimum of eight years in federal prison. Sign the custody agreement, Mr. Halston, and Audrey will decline to press criminal charges. You will walk away a free man. Penniless, but free.”
Derek sat completely motionless for nearly two full minutes. The only sound in the boardroom was the hum of the air conditioning and the distant murmur of the city below.
Finally, Derek lifted his head. His eyes were dead, hollowed out, entirely stripped of pride, vanity, and youth.
He looked at Audrey Vance—the woman he had thought was a mouse, the woman he had tried to step on, the woman whose immense grace had carried him for six years.
“Give me the pen,” Derek whispered.
Frank Geller put a hand on his arm. “Derek, if you sign this, you have nothing. You won't even be able to pay my legal fee.”
“I said give me the pen!” Derek screamed, tears streaming down his face as he snatched the Montblanc pen from Arthur’s hand.
With a trembling hand, Derek Halston signed his name on the line.
He signed away the house. He signed away the business. He signed away the alimony. And he signed away his rights as a father.
When the last page was turned, Audrey stood up.
She buttoned her wool coat, smoothed her gloves, and picked up her leather handbag.
She looked down at Derek one last time. There was no triumph in her face. There was only the profound, peaceful closure of a mother who had successfully defended her child.
“Goodbye, Derek,” Audrey said softly.
May you like
She turned and walked out of the conference room, her heels clicking rhythmically against the hardwood floor, stepping into the golden elevator that carried her down toward her new life.
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