Chapter 13 - The Auditing of Apex Stratos
By Thursday morning, our counter-offensive had moved into the digital deep waters of global finance. While Raymond Vance’s attorneys were preparing their subpoenas in New York and Columbus, Brian and I were holed up in the secure operations bunker beneath Hangar 1 at the aerospace sanctuary.
Surrounding us were four elite forensic financial investigators led by Nathan Cross—a former Special Agent with the FBI’s Financial Crimes Division whom my father had retained decades ago to protect Horizon Continental from corporate takeovers.
On three massive flat-panel monitors, complex spider-web diagrams mapped the flow of capital through fourteen shell corporations registered in the British Virgin Islands, Cyprus, and Delaware.
"Look at this node right here, Mrs. Sterling," Nathan Cross said, tapping his screen with an electronic stylus. "Apex Stratos Capital claims to be a consortium of private European hedge funds. But when we cracked the secondary cryptographic layers on their transaction clearing accounts in Luxembourg, look whose signature authorized the initial seed capital twenty-four months ago."
A digitized corporate wire transfer popped up on the center display.
The authorizing signatory was not Raymond Vance.
It was Marcus Vance—using the corporate operational credentials of Horizon Continental Airlines while he was still serving as Chief Flight Operations Director.
Brian leaned forward, his hands resting on the edge of the console, his eyes scanning the account numbers with razor-sharp precision. "Marcus didn't just falsify flight rosters to hide Tyler and Vanessa’s affair. He was siphoning jet-fuel hedging reserves from our Midwest operations account to fund his father’s private short-selling shell companies."
"Exactly," Nathan Cross nodded. "Marcus was stealing Horizon Continental’s own operational cash reserves and feeding them into Apex Stratos. When Marcus was arrested at Gate B12, the pipeline froze. Raymond Vance isn't attacking your trust because he’s an opportunistic genius, Audrey. He’s attacking because without Horizon Continental’s assets to backstop those loans, Apex Stratos is facing an eighty-million-dollar margin call on Friday morning."
"The whole conglomerate is an insolvent house of cards," I whispered, the sheer depravity of the scheme becoming crystal clear. "Raymond Vance is drowning. He’s trying to seize our aircraft fleet to pledge them as collateral before the European banking regulators realize his funds are empty."
"And he’s using Evelyn Holloway’s petty greed to open the door," Brian added, turning to look at me. "If we present this to the federal prosecutors in Chicago, Raymond Vance will be in an orange jumpsuit beside his children by sundown."
"No," I said, stepping away from the glowing screens and looking out through the reinforced glass toward the runway where Mason was playing fetch with Barnaby in the afternoon sun. "If we file federal charges now, Vance’s attorneys will tie the evidence up in jurisdictional motions for two years while the press continues to harass Mason outside his school. We need to cut the head off this serpent in front of the entire world."
"How?" Brian asked, walking over to stand beside me, his shoulder brushing against mine with unyielding support.
"Tomorrow is Evelyn Holloway's emergency family court hearing in Columbus," I said, turning to meet his gaze. "Raymond Vance is flying into Ohio on his private jet to personally observe the proceedings from the gallery. He thinks he’s attending my public humiliation."
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I picked up my secure satellite phone, dialing the direct line of United States Attorney Marcus Reed in Chicago.
"David," I spoke as the line connected. "Tell the federal marshals in Chicago to gas up their transport vans. We have a flight manifest to execute in Ohio."
