HIS WIFE, HIS REVENGE

Damian let the photograph sit in the folder for three days before he faced it again. He set his glass down, untouched, the ice fracturing with a soft c***k—not even the whiskey felt right tonight. The folder caught the light as he slid it to the edge of his desk. Forty floors below, Manhattan buzzed—cars tracing their nerve-bright grid, horns somewhere in the distance, the whole city swirling in its usual late-night indifference. Here he was, high above it all, quietly rewriting the last half-decade of his life. You’ve read it four times,” Michael said from the doorway. He never knocked, and he certainly didn’t wait to be invited in—just loosened his tie and sank into the chair across from Damian, like the office belonged to him too. “I like being certain.” “And are you?” Michael pressed, eyes flicking toward the folder. Damian didn’t answer. He pushed the folder where Michael could see. The photograph tacked to the report was old—grainy, timestamped, almost faded, two men shaking hands out in front of a building the city had long since erased. His father, Richard Blackwood—standing tall, smiling that invincible smile he always wore when he thought things would last. And beside him, Victor Vale. “The forensic accountant finished last night,” Damian said. “The routing on those Meridian transfers—it’s off. Doesn’t line up with the record the SEC used. Someone doctored the transactions after they happened.” Michael leaned in. “Not before?” “No. After. And that means the version everyone’s believed, the one that sank my father, isn’t what happened. Somebody rewrote history after the fact.” The room went silent. Somewhere a phone rang with stubborn hopefulness. Nobody moved to answer it. “Five years,” Michael said, voice low. “And now the foundation you built your life on starts to shake.” Damian shook his head. “No, Mike. The ground was never solid. I just didn’t want to see it.” He tried to let the relief sink in, that the cracks he’d hunted might be real. He’d spent so long watching for this—proof that Vale wasn’t innocent as everyone thought, that someone had lied, but the satisfaction didn’t come. If someone tampered with the evidence, it meant he’d been led by the nose for five years, playing a game on someone else’s board. Damian hated being handled. That’s the part that stung. Someone had counted on him to believe the wrong story. “So now what?” Michael asked. “You’ve built this whole thing—every move, every dollar, every headline—on evidence that might’ve been faked. What now?” Damian closed the folder, thumb tapping the edge. “I need more than numbers and accountants. I need someone who knows what happens in that family, who doesn’t care about the Vale story holding together. Someone close.” “You really think Victor will talk to you? He’s been avoiding you for years.” “I’m not after Victor.” Michael’s expression shifted, gears turning behind his eyes—the kind of thing you only get from a dozen years of friendship. “Elena Vale.” “She’s not on the board. She’s not part of the deals. Victor has always kept her out of the family’s business, and that either means he’s sheltering her from it, or she’s the only one he doesn’t control. Either way—she’s lived two rooms from the truth her whole life without anyone handing her the key.” “You mean to get close to her,” Michael said, voice carefully flat. “You want to use her.” “I’m getting close to the truth. She’s just standing near it.” They sat there for a moment, Michael picking his words as if they were physical objects he had to hand-polish first. “You know what you’re doing, right? Because you have a talent for soft-pedaling ugliness. Don’t pretend you don’t.” Damian turned back to the window, city lights melting together in the glass. “I’ve used uglier words for it at three in the morning.” “And still?” “And still. I’m not stopping.” He knew Michael didn’t like that answer. Hell, Damian didn’t like it either—but honesty was all he really had left to give his father. Richard Blackwood died under a cloud no truth managed to cut through, and Damian wasn’t going to waste five more years pretending the fight was finished. “You’ve met her,” Michael reminded him. “At the Whitfield benefit. Two years ago.” “I remember.” Vividly. He remembered her standing a little apart, lost in thought in front of an abstract painting the rest of the crowd ignored. There was something about her—unaffected, real in a room full of actors. He hadn’t spoken to her then. He hadn’t thought there’d be a reason. There was now. “I want everything you have on Elena Vale by tomorrow. Work, friends, her calendar. I want to know which events she chooses and which ones Victor nudges her toward.” “And what, you’re just going to show up where she does?” “I’ll be where she plans to be, and I’ll let her decide if I’m worth talking to.” “That’s not exactly much of a plan.” “I only have to get her talking. Doesn’t take long for people to spill something they weren’t planning to, as long as they think it’s just a conversation.” Michael’s look softened—less business, more old friend. “And what about when she learns the real reason? Elena’s not stupid. And from what I’ve seen, Vale women don’t stay in the dark forever.” Damian’s answer didn’t come quick. He stared at that photograph one more time—Richard’s hope, Victor’s steady hand, a friendship gone venomous. “By the time she figures it out,” he said, “I’ll already have what I need.” It sounded colder when he spoke it aloud. He noticed that, felt it like a chill in the room. But he set it aside the same way he set aside anything that might slow him down. There wasn’t room to stop now. Michael stood, fastening his jacket. He knew when to leave, always did—knew when a conversation was over even if nothing felt finished. “I hope you’re right, Damian, truly. I hope you catch whoever did this, and that nobody gets hurt who didn’t deserve it. But Elena isn’t just a door. Don’t pretend she is after you’ve gone through. Remember, at the end—do you really want the truth, or do you just want to win?” He left before Damian could answer, and somehow that silence stayed even after the door clicked shut. Damian stood at the window, that cityscape still glittering, Manhattan too far away to care if his life was breaking open. Somewhere out there, Elena Vale’s life was coasting along, untouched by anything he’d done—yet. He thought of his father’s last words. Someone is setting me up. The certainty had killed him more than the trial itself. Damian wouldn’t let that happen again. He wasn’t waiting anymore. He would chase the truth down himself. He picked up the folder, stared a moment longer at that old handshake, before closing it with a dare. Tomorrow, he’d find out where Elena planned to be next. And he’d be there first.