Chapter 7 - The $3.4 Million Mirage|
The room was deathly quiet. Nobody moved. Nobody drank. Even the waiters stopped service, standing frozen against the mahogany walls.
Ethan Shaw pressed a button on a remote control. The large presentation screens behind the stage—usually reserved for quarterly earnings slides—flickered to life.
A high-resolution financial flow chart filled the screen.
“Crestline Media billed Aurelia four hundred and twenty thousand dollars in February for an investor relations campaign,” Ethan explained. “However, internal records show that Aurelia’s in-house communications team completed that exact same campaign.”
Ethan shifted to the next slide.
“The work was duplicated. The outside invoice was fraudulent.”
Julian’s jaw worked silently. He looked around the room, desperate to find an ally among the board members, but every executive was staring straight ahead, avoiding his eyes.
“Where did the money go?” Audrey asked, holding her microphone steady.
“The payment trail from Crestline Media moved through two shell entities,” Ethan explained, pointing a red laser pointer at the screen. “And finally deposited into a primary account belonging to an entity named CP Ventures LLC.”
Audrey looked down at Camilla Price.
“CP Ventures,” Audrey repeated slowly. “Camilla Price Ventures.”
Gasps echoed across the ballroom.
Camilla’s face went from pale to ghostly white. She looked at Julian, her lips trembling.
“Julian... do something!” she hissed in a panicked whisper.
Julian’s eyes darted frantically between the screen and his mistress.
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“CP Ventures is a legitimate consulting firm!” Julian blurted out, his voice cracking slightly. “She did work for us before she joined Aurelia!”
“She joined Aurelia two years ago, Julian,” Audrey reminded him calmly. “These invoices were submitted four months ago.”
