Chapter 64 Chapter 0064

Chapter 64 Chapter 0064
•SLOANE•

I sat there, frozen, and didn't know how to react to seeing them. I couldn't believe that they had traveled all the way to Amberfield to see me. To see Sloane Vale.

Five years had gone by without seeing my father. When Valerie killed me after the night he announced me as his heiress, I realized that going back to him would lead me to another early grave.

But now he was here. He came to me, together with the woman who had taken my life because she didn't want me to be named as my father’s heiress instead of her daughter.

"We are sorry to have kept you waiting, Miss Vale," my father said as they sat down on the other side of the table. "We were running late due to the traffic."

He looked at me and for a brief moment, I thought he would see me. I was his firstborn daughter, the one whom he declared as his heiress in front of his guests.

But he turned to Valerie. "This is my wife, Valerie. She's my assistant and has been there with me since day one when I started my business with Brian Taylor."

"It's a pleasure to meet you both." I smiled, realizing that they couldn't recognize me.

Of course, they wouldn't. I went back to a day after my banishment the last time I died. Valerie didn't know now that I was her husband's daughter, and my father didn't know that I was Raven.

I wanted to turn them down and tell them that I wouldn't be able to represent them anymore in court, but Valerie took my life and never paid for that.

She was the reason I was taken back to Blackwood to suffer the loss of my child all over again. She took everything from me and left me to die.

And now was the perfect time to make her pay for killing me.

"Garrett told me a little about your case, but he didn't start from the beginning, and what led to the fallout of your business partnership," I said as I pulled out the documents I had printed from the email.

I placed them on the table and they looked at each other before looking at me.

"Brian and my husband were in a business partnership to build the first largest mall in the small town of North Ash, but instead of discussing things professionally with my husband, he went behind our backs and informed his lawyers that we were misusing the funds assigned to the project. This led to many sponsors pulling out from the collab because they could no longer trust my husband. And now he went ahead and sued him for twenty-five million."

I nodded and took notes. With Valerie involved, I was more than certain that they were guilty.

"Brian Taylor came to me," he chimed in. "Not the other way around. I want you to understand that from the beginning, Miss Vale, because the way he is presenting this case makes it sound as though he was doing us a favor by entering this partnership. He was not. He needed my contacts and my land rights in North Ash to make this project viable. Without me, he had nothing but an idea and a name."

"How long had you known him before the partnership agreement was signed?" I asked.

"Eight years," Valerie answered before my father could. "We socialized with Brian and his wife for eight years before any business conversation was ever had. We attended their daughter's wedding. We were at his mother's funeral." She paused and sighed. "Eight years of friendship, and he turned around and did this to us."

I wrote the number down.

"And the partnership itself," I answered. "How long had that been active before the dispute arose?"

"Fourteen months," my father replied. "Fourteen months of my money, my time, and my reputation invested into a project that was on schedule and under budget, I might add, until Brian decided that the numbers weren't moving fast enough for his liking."

"What was his specific complaint about the funds?"

Valerie's expression tightened. "He claimed that Tank was redirecting project funds into personal accounts. Which is completely false and provably so. Every transaction is documented and every expense was approved by both parties at the time it was made. Brian signed off on those approvals himself. Now he wants to pretend he didn't."

"We have the records," my father added. "All of them. My accountant has prepared a full audit trail going back to the first deposit."

"I'll need all of that," I answered. "Every approval document, every signed release, every communication between you and Mr. Taylor related to finances. Emails, texts, letters, anything in writing."

"It's already being compiled," my father replied. "We have everything in here." He placed a document file on the table and pushed it toward me.

I took the document file and slid it into my briefcase. When I was done, I stood up from the chair. "I will call you if there's anything else I need before the court date."

They got up and shook my hand. I could swear that Valerie was a nice person.

"Thank you, Miss Vale," she answered. "We appreciate you helping us. We trust that you will do everything within your power to help us."

I nodded before I walked to the door and left.

When I got inside my car, I rested my head against the seat, and exhaled. I reviewed Brian's contact numbers on the documents they had provided, and dialed the number on my phone.

He answered the call on the second ring.

"Mr. Taylor, you're speaking to Sloane Vale. I was wondering we can set up a meeting tomorrow morning to talk about Tank Hale." I paused. "He's my client, but I believe that you're right about the lawsuit. And I want to know exactly what happened."