Chapter 13 - THE PRISON VISITATION
Before moving on Site Zero, Marcus insisted that we secure direct testimony regarding the current operational chain of command.
The following morning, I drove to the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility in upstate New York.
Rain beat heavily against the reinforced glass windows of the maximum-security visitation wing.
The room smelled of floor wax, stale coffee, and cold metal.
I sat on one side of a thick plexiglass partition.
A minute later, the heavy steel door opened, and Margaret Veyra was escorted inside by two armed corrections officers.
Her appearance was completely unrecognizable from the night of the hotel gala fifteen years ago.
The tailored designer gowns, the diamond necklaces, and the pristine silver hair were gone.
She wore a dark green state inmate jumpsuit, her grey hair pulled back in a plain knot, her face deeply lined with wrinkles of bitter, unyielding resentment.
She sat down on the metal stool, holding the plastic telephone receiver to her ear with cuffed hands.
I lifted my receiver.
“Hello, Margaret,” I said, keeping my tone flat and unhurried.
Margaret let out a dry, raspy laugh through the speaker.
“Came to inspect the damage, Eleanor?” Margaret sneered.
“Or did you come to boast about your four-billion-dollar fund?”
“I came to ask you about Maya,” I replied.
The sneer vanished from Margaret’s face instantly.
Her body stiffened against her chains, her sharp blue eyes widening in sudden, volatile panic.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she muttered, looking away toward the guard.
“Elias left me his Swiss vault key before he died, Margaret,” I said softly into the microphone.
“I have the dark-market wire logs from 2010.”
“I have the clinical records from Site Zero.”
“And I know that Sterling Veyra is currently managing the facility from Zurich.”
Margaret slammed her cuffed hands against the counter, making the steel chains clank loudly.
“Sterling will crush you!” Margaret shrieked, her voice cracking against the glass.
“You think you won because you humiliated Cameron at a dinner party?!”
“You think you destroyed VeyraTech?!”
“VeyraTech was just a storefront!”
“Sterling controls ninety million dollars in offshore bearer bonds!”
“He holds the legal guardianship papers for that girl!”
“In four months, Maya turns fifteen!”
“Under the 1988 codicil, Sterling will execute the secondary trust petition in a Zurich court, and your family’s remaining estate will be liquidated into our holding accounts!”
I leaned closer to the glass partition, looking Margaret dead in the eye with cold, absolute authority.
“Sterling won’t execute anything, Margaret,” I said, every word dropping like iron.
“Because by four o'clock this afternoon, federal agents will be standing inside Site Zero.”
“And your elder brother will be joining you in a federal holding cell for the rest of his natural life.”
May you like
Margaret stared at me, her mouth open, her face draining of every last drop of color as the reality of her total defeat settled over her.
I set the black telephone receiver back on its hook, stood up, pulled my coat around my shoulders, and walked out into the rain.
