All Chapters of Sorry Nephew... She Wears My Ring Now: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

The dining room smelled of old wood and polished silver. A long table stretched the length of the room with eight chairs arranged around it. Samuel sat at the head, his hands folded on the table, his face carved from stone. Dorinda occupied the chair to his left, her posture rigid and her diamond earrings catching the chandelier light. Victor slumped in the seat beside her, his tie loosened, his eyes darting between the table and the door.Felicia sat at the far end, one hand resting on her belly, the other wrapped around a glass of water. She wore a fitted green dress and an expression of practiced calm, but Claire noticed the slight tremble in her fingers.Emmanuel sat alone on the opposite side, separated from the rest by two empty chairs. He did not look up when Claire entered."Claire." Samuel's voice filled the room. He gestured to the chair at his right. "Sit here. Beside me."Claire crossed the dining room and took the offered seat. Raymond settled into the chair next to her,

Raymond arrived at Samuel's estate at 8:00 AM Saturday morning. The audit team had been working through the night, and Benjamin stood at the front entrance with a stack of printed summaries."Total confirmed losses from the shell company: twelve point four million," Benjamin reported as they walked toward the study. "Additional irregularities flagged in six subsidiary accounts. Dorinda's fingerprints are on all of them.""Any connection to Victor's company beyond the consulting payments to Felicia?""Yes, sir." Benjamin opened his tablet and displayed a flowchart. "Victor's company received a two-million-dollar investment from Dorinda's shell company eighteen months ago. The investment was disguised as a private equity stake from an anonymous investor. Victor may not have known the source, but the money went directly into the Felicia consulting budget."Raymond stopped walking. "Dorinda funded the payments to Felicia using money she stole from Samuel.""In effect, yes. Samuel's own mo

Tuesday morning. 9:00 AM. The patent review office occupied the fourteenth floor of a government building downtown. Gray carpet, fluorescent lights, and walls the color of old milk. Nothing glamorous. Nothing dramatic. Just a windowless room where the fate of Claire's professional legacy would be decided.Raymond arrived at 8:30. Benjamin had already secured their seats and arranged the evidence binders on the table. Three panel members would preside. Two patent examiners and a senior intellectual property adjudicator.Claire walked in at 8:45. She wore her black blazer, white blouse, and the silver chain from her father. Her hair was pulled back tight. Her folder sat under her arm like a shield.She looked at Raymond across the room and gave a single nod. He returned it.Felicia arrived at 8:55, accompanied by her attorney. She wore a simple navy dress and no jewelry. She did not look at Raymond. She did not look at Claire. She sat in the witness area and folded her hands in her lap.

Saturday evening came fast. Claire stood in Sandra's kitchen baking a chocolate cake from her mother's old recipe while Sandra sat on the counter eating frosting from the bowl."Stop eating that," Claire said, pulling the bowl away. "I need enough for the whole cake.""You're baking for a billionaire. He can buy a bakery.""Samuel isn't like that. He's warm and honest and nothing like the rest of them."Sandra licked the spoon. "And his son? The tall, dark, terrifying one who sends you flowers with no card?"Claire's ears burned. She turned back to the oven and pretended to check the temperature."Your ears are pink again," Sandra said."Get out of my kitchen.""It's my kitchen."Claire pulled the cake out at 5:00 PM. She frosted it carefully, wrapped it in foil, and drove to Samuel's estate in her own car. The gate opened the moment she reached it. Someone had programmed her license plate into the system.Raymond met her at the side entrance near the garden."You brought cake," he sa

Claire spent Monday and Tuesday at Valour Design, working on the Geneva presentation between phone calls with her lawyers. The legal team moved fast. By Tuesday evening, the response to Victor's motion was complete: twenty-two pages of counter-arguments backed by bank records, email timestamps, and sworn statements from Valour Design's hiring committee confirming that Claire's employment was based on merit alone."The key argument is independence," Claire's attorney explained over the phone. "We need the judge to see that every professional decision you've made was your own. The hiring, the partnership, the licensing deals. Raymond's ownership stake in Valour is a fact, but his involvement in your career is zero. We have internal emails proving that Valour's leadership didn't even know about his connection to you until after the patent hearing.""Will the judge believe that?""Judges believe evidence. And our evidence is clean."On Wednesday morning, Claire put on her black blazer and