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I'm The Thorn Stuck In The Billionaire Celebrity's Foot 69
"I've written it all out," Trent said, sliding a carefully prepared statement across the conference table, his voice steady despite the visible effort the admission had clearly cost him. "Everything. The mentorship, exactly what Holt taught me, exactly how I applied it against Sterling. I don't want to leave anything out this time, not even the parts that make me look considerably worse than I've let myself admit to anyone."The legal team reviewed the statement carefully, and Ivy watched something shift in the room's collective expression as they read through it, Trent's account considerably more thorough and self-implicating than anyone had expected."This is going to be difficult testimony," the lead attorney said finally, looking up from the pages. "But it's also exactly the kind of honest, unflinching account that tends to land well with a jury. People respond to genuine accountability, especially when it costs the person offering it something real."Trent nodded, something tired
I'm The Thorn Stuck In The Billionaire Celebrity's Foot 68
The subpoena arrived on a Tuesday, formal and unexpected despite months of careful preparation for the trial's broader proceedings, and Ivy stared at the document for a long moment before fully absorbing what it meant."They're deposing me," she said, showing it to Sterling that evening, disbelief and old fear tangling together in her chest. "Not as a formal trial witness, but for pretrial discovery. They want to establish my, and I'm quoting directly here, quote, personal relationship to the alleged victim narrative surrounding the fraud case involving my father, unquote."Sterling's jaw tightened reading it. "They're trying to build the narrative that this entire prosecution is personally motivated. Using your father's case, connecting it directly to your marriage, trying to paint the whole thing as an elaborate act of revenge rather than genuine justice.""Can they do that.""Legally, yes, within certain boundaries. Our legal team will be present the entire time, and there are limi
I'm The Thorn Stuck In The Billionaire Celebrity's Foot 67
Sterling's fury, when Ivy showed him the message that evening, was quieter and more controlled than she expected, the particular, dangerous stillness that had always meant something considerably more serious than shouting."This is harassment," he said, voice tight. "Direct intimidation of a witness, during active litigation. This isn't a gray area anymore, Ivy. This is criminal.""I'm not officially a witness," Ivy pointed out, though the distinction felt thin given the message's clear intent. "I never testified against him directly.""You're his son's wife, connected to nearly every piece of the case against him, and someone on his legal team, or someone working for them, is clearly monitoring you closely enough to know about the pregnancy before most of our own extended family did." Sterling's jaw was tight. "That's not a coincidence, and it's not something we're going to just absorb quietly."They reported the message to the police and to Sterling's legal team the following mornin
I'm The Thorn Stuck In The Billionaire Celebrity's Foot 66
Ivy arrived at Vane Tower twenty minutes later, Declan's warning still sitting uneasy in her chest, and found Sterling and Reagan already gathered in the conference room, a thick stack of legal documents spread across the table between them."Holt's defense team filed this as part of discovery," Reagan said, sliding a folder toward Ivy the moment she sat down. "It's meant to undermine Trent's credibility as a witness. I want you to see it before it becomes public, because it's going to complicate things considerably, regardless of how the trial actually goes."Ivy opened the folder, and felt her stomach drop reading the first page, old, careful documentation of financial transactions between Trent and a company Ivy didn't recognize, dated years before any of the Vane Corp chaos had started."What is this," she asked slowly."Evidence that Trent's takeover pattern, the same one that eventually led him to Vane Corp, actually started with direct coaching from Holt himself, years before B
I'm The Thorn Stuck In The Billionaire Celebrity's Foot 65
The next few weeks passed in a warm, steady rhythm that felt, to Ivy, like the particular kind of peace she'd once been terrified to fully believe in, wedding chaos and Holt's threats and even the recent Ashworth complication all settling into the past, replaced by the quiet, precious ordinariness of early pregnancy and a career she'd genuinely built with her own two hands.The first ultrasound came at ten weeks, Ivy and Sterling crowded into a small exam room, both of them holding their breath at the particular, surreal sight of a small, flickering heartbeat on the screen."That's really happening," Sterling said, voice thick with wonder, his hand finding Ivy's and gripping tight. "That's actually our baby.""That's actually our baby," Ivy confirmed, tears threatening despite the joy, the doctor's careful, reassuring commentary fading into background noise beneath the enormity of the moment.They told her parents in person that weekend, her mother's reaction somewhere between joyful
I'm The Thorn Stuck In The Billionaire Celebrity's Foot 64
Ivy met Kennedy at the firm within the hour, the excited pregnancy plans temporarily set aside for the particular, familiar tension of a business situation shifting unexpectedly, and studied the revised documents Kennedy spread across the conference table with a growing, uneasy focus."The original terms gave both companies equal operational control over the shared regional infrastructure," Kennedy said, tracing a finger down the new language. "This version quietly shifts majority decision making authority to Ashworth Logistics, buried in language dense enough that most people wouldn't catch it without reading closely.""That's not what we agreed to in the first meeting," Ivy said, something cold settling low in her stomach despite the day's earlier joy."No. It isn't." Kennedy's expression was grim. "I don't know if this is Declan overreaching on his own initiative, or something else entirely. But I wanted you to see it before it went to Sterling's team, given how closely you've been
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