Chapter 8 - The Shark
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Marcus Thorne’s law office did not look like a place where marriages ended; it looked like a place where corporations were violently dismantled.
Situated on the fiftieth floor of a steel-and-glass tower, the office featured black marble floors, minimalist leather furniture, and absolutely no personal photographs. Thorne was widely considered the most ruthless, expensive divorce attorney on the Eastern Seaboard. He didn't take cases based on emotion; he took them based on the potential for catastrophic financial victory.
I sat across the massive desk from him, my posture perfectly straight.
Thorne reviewed the printed photographs of the offshore bank statements, the LLC deeds, and the Paris jewelry receipt. He was a man in his late fifties, with silver hair and eyes like a hawk evaluating a field mouse. But he wasn't looking at me like a mouse.
“Your husband has been very busy, Mrs. Vance,” Thorne murmured, tapping a gold pen against the desk. “Creating an untraceable LLC to purchase property across state lines, funneling marital assets into Cayman accounts… it’s a classic, albeit highly sophisticated, concealment strategy.”
“Can we touch the offshore accounts?” I asked, my voice completely devoid of tremor.
Thorne looked up, an appreciative glint in his sharp eyes. “Normally, piercing an offshore trust requires years of litigation and millions in forensic accounting. But Richard made a fatal flaw. He used the primary corporate accounts of Horizon Prime to initially fund the shell companies before transferring the assets offshore.”
“Embezzlement,” I stated.
“Exactly,” Thorne smiled, a terrifying expression. “He commingled marital assets with corporate funds to hide them from you. If we expose this during discovery, not only does he lose the divorce, but he faces federal fraud charges and the complete loss of his company.”
“I don't want to expose him during discovery, Mr. Thorne,” I said smoothly, leaning forward. “If we wait for the courts, he will have time to move the money again, or leverage his political connections to stall. I want to secure the assets before he even knows I’m filing.”
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Thorne raised a silver eyebrow. “You are proposing a preemptive financial strike. That requires access to the internal routing codes of Horizon Prime. Codes only Richard and his immediate executive team possess.”
“I know,” I said, picking up my purse. “Which is why I am going to have a very pointed conversation with his executive assistant tomorrow morning.”
