Friday, July 29, 2016
Tech Geniuses
Trey was ready to meet what the day held in store head on. Alexandra still didn't know, but she would soon. He hadn't told her because at twenty-five weeks pregnant, she was worried enough about her condition.
That was the only thing that made him second guess his decision.
Over the past three to four weeks, Trey had spent most of his time working together with Billy, Mitch, Jason, and sometimes Dustin, to get everything in place. He'd spent more time with Nicolysse, making her feel he was still interested in her; he wasn't.
And though Alexandra understood he had to do it, he didn't intend on dragging it out at all.
He'd done a little digging and he'd found quite interesting facts from the past both far back and recent. As a result, he had invited his ex, his stepmother, his father—as just a witness to the events that would unfold—and Ethan to his office.
Getting the latter to come had been easy.
After officially divorcing Alexandra (which she'd agreed to for a fresh start), he'd allowed them to be filmed coming out of the courtroom, and all he'd said when asked was 'It's no big deal. She just isn't my wife anymore, so she can do what she wants without either of you slamming her name', then he'd left them to stew over it, dropping her off at the house to 'hang out' with his ex.
Owing to the fact that the machines were set up in their home, he went to the new house during the day (the nursery had been completed) and snuck home at night to kiss and hold her.
And the tabloids were eating it up. They'd—inadvertently—helped Trey achieve his goal, because then, all he had to do was admit defeat and Ethan came to visit with an 'I told you so', having known that Alexandra had gone back to Trey.
Dumb enough as he was, Ethan hadn't left immediately. He'd still threatened to take their children, and knowing quite dreadful information about Ethan's company, Trey had pretended he was desperate for heirs to his fortune to survive.
So, he told Ethan to come to the annual meeting, and there, Trey would announce him as the head of the Hampstead branch (HQ) and others—sharing his assets so that Ethan wouldn't touch his kids.
Donovan had agreed with a gloating smirk, thinking he'd won, with no idea he'd just been played. Having to get Nicolysse and his stepmother there was the easiest, but he couldn't help but notice how lackluster Valerie was starting to look. Perhaps, guilt was eating at her.
Still, he pushed on.
It was time to end it—once and for all.
A single knock at his door pulled him out of his thoughts, then Gale entered, closing it behind himself. "Security, the police, your managerial heads, special guests, the media, witnesses... everything is in place.
"I called your sister too, and she, together with the others, will prepare your wife for it before turning on the TV." He paused, taking a deep breath. They were really doing this. "Ready when you are sir."
Trey nodded, turning away from his window to grab his phone—anything to stall a little. Suddenly, he was doubting Alexandra's strength to handle it. But he hadn't told her also because she would've tried to stop him. He wanted to do this, and he would.
"I'm ready."
*
Trey stood before them, ignoring the smile Nicolysse sent his way. She obviously felt privileged to be here when Alexandra wasn't, and Trey let her think what she wanted to.
It'd be over soon.
He took a deep breath that calmed his racing heart a bit. "There's an announcement I'd like to make," he said in a clear voice, making eye contact with a smug Ethan. "But, before that, I'd like to address something."
He made eye contact with Gale, who nodded, looking back down on the computer being used for the projections. Gale connected the hidden cameras videoing from their designated spots around the room (to capture different angles) to the big screen outside their building, and the tied-in media stations who'd agreed to broadcast live on their channels.
As soon as Gale gave him the thumbs up, he continued speaking. "Over the past few months, a scandal involving my wife surfaced, and I haven't come forward to say anything. Today, I will address that."
He walked to one side, leaving the huge TV screen onto which they project on full display. "Before anything, I want to say that I am sorry for publicly embarrassing her. I thought I was doing the right thing letting her go, but that doesn't excuse my crass attitude. And though I have apologized to her personally, I want the world to know that she is an amazing woman I would never stop loving."
He paused, his eyes finding Nicolysse, who had a scowl on her face. He leaned against the wall, with arms crossed over his chest. "Some might wonder why I finalize my divorce with her when I claim I love her, but it will be clear in a bit."
This time, he made direct eye contact with Ethan, who looked confused. "Let's get to the real deal, shall we? I'll say it straight up: Ethan Donovan was behind the scandal and everything that went into making it a reality."
"What on earth are you talking about?" Ethan asked, projecting a confused expression. "I need my lawyer here before you begin accusing me of things I haven't done."
"This isn't a courtroom or a police station, Donovan. I'm also not asking you to say anything, so why are you getting defensive already?" Trey said coolly, his lips kicking up in a small smile.
"Just sit back, and watch everything play out." Ethan had nothing to say to that as he wanted to look innocent. "First video," Trey instructed, and nodding, Gale put on the video.
"You all probably recognized this video from the fact that it went viral with claims that my wife, Alexandra, cheated on me with him," he gestured to Ethan, "who so conveniently happens to be her ex. But is it really my wife?"
Bringing up the remote, he fast forwarded to the point where Ethan was kissing the woman, pausing when her neck was on full display. "The woman in the video has a tattoo of a star on her neck, whereas," he flipped it to a picture of his wife, "my wife has none. She has no ink anywhere on her body."
Playing the video again, he fast forwarded to when Ethan was kissing down her belly and paused. "Once again, the woman in the video has a piercing next to her navel, whereas my wife," another picture of Alexandra sleeping—her shirt riding up a little—came up, "has none. There is no hole for a ring even—it's smooth."
Ethan smirked. "How sure are you that she didn't have a piercing before you came along? I was on the scene before you appeared."
Trey smiled confidently. Putting on a slideshow of her pictures, he continued. "These are pictures from when she turned 12 through to now. She has never inked, nor pierced. I know my wife well enough, thank you very much," he told him, smiling.
The heads turn to look at Ethan, wondering what made him cause all the stir; why he went through all the trouble. "If you still want to deny it, then see for yourself." The woman from the video walked in, glaring at Ethan, and it unnerved Trey just how much she looked like Lexi. "This is Karena Fields."
The woman in question pushed her hair backwards to reveal the tattoo, her cropped top already leaving her pierced belly on display. "Why did you do it?" Trey asked, and no further explanation was needed to know what Trey was referring to.
Karena shrugged lightly. "I don't hate Alexandra, neither do I have a personal vendetta against her. She's sweet really, but I wanted the money, and he said he just wanted you to back off. I didn't know he was going to show it to the whole world."
"So this is what you have reduced yourself to?" Ethan cut in, scoffing. "Hiring and paying people to testify against me. Like I said, I need my lawyer."
"How dare you?" she hissed. "I only got half of my money and I've been painted a slut to the whole world! And you have the guts to still run your mouth? Have you no shame?!"
She reached into her bag. "You know, unlike you, I have a sense of shame. Here's your five hundred thousand," she said, throwing the cheque at him. "You know where to shove it.
"I'm not interested in making money off someone's misery—even if it's for a 'good' cause. But, karma is real." She stepped back with a satisfied smile, "I'll see you in court."
With that she exited the conference room, her head held high. Ethan sat still in his spot, the cheque untouched as his jaw ticked. He didn't like this, but there was nothing he could say without incriminating himself. Besides, there his name was on the cheque!
Trey smirked at him, receiving a glare. "Next on the list." The next batch of people were ushered in and he mentioned their names as they entered, hands cuffed behind their backs.
"Djamila Ayad, Robert Davies, Natalia Cortez and Jared Tomlinson." Trey looked at Ethan, who kept getting more tense as time went by. "Look familiar?" he asked, expecting no response. He pushed off the side of the table he was leaning on, walking around the room.
"You had Cortez make extra lenses for you, not knowing we had a way of tracking how many pieces were made. You also intended on duplicating my design, hoping you'd get your people to advance it better and steal my clients.
"You had Davies make sure these never went in the records and he again made sure camera footage was deleted. But, you should know by now that you can't hide deleted scenes from me." Trey winked, patting Ethan on the shoulder as he walked past him.
"As if it wasn't enough, you had Tomlinson rope a guy in need in and offered him money for his daughter's treatment." Trey shook his head. "And when this said guy tries to back out, you had Ayad dig up dirt on him and threatened to expose it as well as pulling the plug on his daughter's life. And that's exactly what you did.
"You had her," Trey pointed to a short brunette with puffy eyes who'd just entered, "pull the oxygen off a seven year old whose life depended on it. She got fired because she failed her job as a nurse and she's going to face the charges."
He stood at the front again, looking Ethan in the eye. "Trying to kill her father for being a loose end is something else, but making a seven year old suffer to the point of death is too much, don't you agree?"
Ethan's jaw ticked as he tried to rein in his temper. The odds were stacked against him, and he'd known he should've tied all the loose ends—he'd delayed just a bit and here it was, blowing up in his face.
The door opened, and Colton entered, smiling wryly when Ethan's eyes went wide. "Surprised?" Trey asked, and Ethan sat up, pretending he didn't know who Colton was.
"He's very much alive, because the man you hired couldn't bring himself to kill an innocent man." Colton waved, making Ethan's blood boil, but he was still quiet, unwilling to incriminate himself any further.
"What about these?" Trey went on, switching to the next on the itinerary—the deleted scenes from his house. "There you are, and anyone would agree that even in a ski mask, you're pretty recognizable.
"You go into my office and use my invention—which you stole—to again steal pages of the new project I was working on. Then, you went ahead to speak to my wife, telling her she was yours and that she should remember that?"
Trey scoffed. "First, let's talk about how you got inside my house in the first place—which is trespassing, by the way. You hired a jailed murderer," he flicked to a picture of Leander, "to threaten one of my men into letting you in.
"You had him threaten to kill Dustin's wife and child in front of him, but your man decided to take Dustin's wife and child away, saying they would be returned once he'd let you in."
Ethan scoffed, tugging on his tie to loosen it. "Why would I want to go into your house? And threatening people? Are you insane? I'd never stoop so low." It was difficult for him to say those words because it meant, in effect, that he had stooped low, and that was humiliating.
Trey smiled through his clenched jaw. Ethan looked uncomfortable, and his managers were equally squeamish though they weren't the ones on the receiving end of it. "I didn't want to do this. It was supposed to be a last resort," he said, nodding at Gale.
Leander came in, cuffed, and sat among the managers as planned, while his assistant paged Dustin, giving Trey a thumbs up once he was done.
A minute or more later, the door opened, and Dustin came through first with Zoey clutching his hand in a vice-like grip. When she spotted Trey standing at the end of the long table, she grinned and ran over to him, crashing into his legs.
He chuckled, going a bit off balance, but as soon as he steadied them both, he ruffled her hair. "I didn't know daddy was bringing me here to you," she said in an innocent, yet joyful voice, and that made him feel bad. He caught Dustin's gaze and he was rewarded with a nod which said 'do what you have to do.'
He squatted so he was on eye level with Zoey, and he smiled genuinely, forgetting for a second that he was in the middle of something. "What did you do today?"
She lowered her voice to a whisper and leaned forward. "Aunt Mel got me ice cream this morning!" she whispered. "Please don't tell daddy. He'll take me to the dentist and I don't want to go there. Then I spent time with Lexi in her room," she added in one breath.
Trey smiled again, appreciating their efforts to make sure his wife didn't feel alone. "I won't, don't worry. Your secret's safe with me." He accepted her hug, squeezing her till she giggled. When she pulled away, still grinning, he said, "I need you to do something for me."
She tilted her head to the side. "What?"
"I want you to walk around the room with me, and tell me who you know, and how. Can you do that?"
"I think so," she answered hesitantly, rubbing her hands against her skirt.
"It's okay if you don't want to," he told her, tipping her chin up. "But, if you do agree to it, I'll hold your hand and never let go till you're done. Do you trust me?"
She nodded slowly, taking the hand he'd offered. He rose to his full height, and started going around the room so she could get a proper look at everyone. She leaned into him, hiding from their gazes as much as she could without blocking her view of them.
Then she stopped suddenly, going back and dragged Trey after her. Then she pointed. "That man," Leander, of course, but what he didn't expect was for her to point again at another person, saying, "and him."
Ethan.
"Him too?" She nodded, narrowing her eyes at Ethan. Trey was genuinely surprised, because no one had mentioned Zoey ever seeing Ethan, and he wondered if she knew him because she'd seen him on TV. So, he asked. "How do you know them?"
"That man came to our house while I was sleeping, and when me and mommy came downstairs, he was holding a gun." Leander only lowered his head, knowing it was true, while Ethan worked on trying to glare at the girl into shutting up.
It didn't work.
"He told us to stand against the wall, and said he'll paint the wall with brains for daddy to see." All present gasped, and Trey could imagine the reaction of those watching from home or outside the company.
Zoey tilted her head to look up at him. "What does it mean?"
"I'll explain later," he replied quietly, rubbing the back of her hand.
That answer was good enough for her, so she continued her story. "He took us somewhere, then this man came there," she said, pointing at Ethan. "He asked why the big man didn't shoot one of us to make a point and had to bring us to his place. Then he said a bad word, so I kicked his leg and ran off calling him a bad man."
And not surprisingly, Zoey's little stunt made those around laugh—well except Ethan, who was scowling. "Thank you very much," Trey told her, squishing her in a hug.
"You owe me one," she muttered, then pulled away, running off to her dad. "You'll pay in ice-cream and legos!" she yelled as she ran out of the room, and again, they laughed for a moment before the atmosphere turned bleak again.
"Where's your conscience Donovan?" Trey was still smiling that way, making him look creepier by the minute. He brought up the remote, flicking through several short videos of when Ethan was threatening the website editors to post nudes of Alexandra. "Mind you, these sites will be sued for helping you with defamation."
He showed the notes and screenshots of messages Ethan sent to his wife, the final one clearly containing the threats. The next set were the pictures of his lair at different angles, and at that, Ethan's eyebrows shot up. "How do you know for sure that's my house?"
Trey looked to his assistant, saying, "Pull up the live feed from his house please."
Trey looked at Ethan's face while the national TV journalist was covering the room alongside the police, realizing he looked ashen. "It's over," Trey said. "Leave Lexi alone. If you truly love her, you'd let her be with whoever makes her the happiest. That is love."
He paused. "Also, I fully divorced my wife—and she agreed to it—to give the idea that I was no longer interested in her, and to get you right where I wanted. It worked, didn't it? You came crawling out, wanting your share of her portion of my assets.
"I truly would've given you some money, but that was until I found this." Pressing the remote again, the next set of pictures was the financial statements for Ethan's company, with huge negatives. He was going bankrupt.
The room erupted in chatter as Ethan sat there with his face flaming, both from anger and embarrassment. "If you're bankrupt from pocketing the company's money for yourself and having almost no clients, your investors deserve to know, don't you think?"
At that, Ethan jumped out of his seat, advancing towards Trey. "It's all your fault!" he growled, sounding like the words had been ripped from somewhere deep inside him. His neck veins popped, and together with his wide-open eyes, he looked crazed. "You take away the woman I love—"
"You had broken up with her when I met her. You had broken her heart," he corrected calmly, unfazed by Ethan's fury.
"I broke up with her to teach her a lesson! And to make her jealous!"
"Then you can't blame me if you lost someone good to me." He smiled victoriously, and that enraged Ethan further. Ethan swung a fist but Trey caught it right before it slammed into his jaw, and in a second, that hand was behind his back, being cuffed. He added the other hand before Ethan could register what was going on.
"You made me lose everything!" Ethan continued, struggling against the cuffs. "You snatched my girl, my clients—everything!"
Sighing in frustration, Trey replied saying, "I started at the age of seventeen, Donovan, and I built my company on the earnings made. You can't accuse me of stealing your clients when I was in the business before you. You only went into it because you saw it was profitable, but not because you had any knowledge on it."
Trey signaled the policemen who'd just entered to take him away, which they managed to, but not before he yelled, "This isn't over! This is far from over! I'll be back, and I'll get all that is rightfully mine!"
Trey sighed, setting his hands on his hips. "Well, that was... that." He walked forward, cracking his knuckles and smiling. "But we're far from over. There's more we need to address." When he looked in their direction, they paled instantly, knowing he was onto them.
"Let's move on to my ex and stepmother, shall we?"
A/N: Chapter's a little on the long side, but I hope you like it. Don't forget to vote and share if you liked it, and I'll see you in the next chapter.