Chapter 20 - The Corporate Autopsy
By Tuesday evening, the Moretti estate’s third-floor library had been transformed into a war room. Spread across the massive mahogany table were hundreds of pages of financial disclosures, bank statements, shell company registrations, and land titles.
Sloan sat at the center of it all, her hair pulled back into a tight braid, a red correction pen in her hand. She had spent the last twenty-four hours analyzing Gregory’s financial footprint with the cold precision of an executioner.
"He’s leveraged to the hilt," Sloan said, pointing a finger at a complex web of offshore accounts routed through Delaware and the Cayman Islands. "Gregory didn't buy that debt with his own capital. He used a shell corporation backed by a syndicate of Boston real estate speculators who think they can bulldoze Harbor Ridge for pennies on the dollar before the zoning laws change next spring."
Raphael leaned over the table, studying the balance sheets with an expert eye. He smelled faintly of expensive tobacco and rain. "And his primary lender is the Bay State Mercantile Bank—an institution that currently owes three million dollars in unpaid default penalties to a trust fund that my holding company secretly bought out six months ago."
Sloan looked up, her eyes widening in sudden, sharp realization. "You own his bank?"
"I own the debt that keeps his bank solvent," Raphael corrected smoothly, a dark, predatory smile touching his lips. "Gregory thinks he’s playing a high-stakes game of corporate chess. He doesn't realize he’s standing on a trapdoor I built last winter."
"I don't want him ruined financially," Sloan said quietly, though her fingers tightened around her pen. "I want him neutralized. I want Harbor Ridge’s lease secured in perpetuity, with an ironclad endowment that no speculator can ever touch again."
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Raphael straightened up, looking down at her with a look of profound, unmasked respect. "Then we don't just foreclose on him, Sloan. We execute a hostile takeover of his entire portfolio, strip away his real estate division, and donate the Harbor Ridge land deed directly to your sister’s facility as an anonymous charitable trust. He won't even have enough legal standing left to sue a parking meter."
"Let's write the audit," Sloan said, a fierce, beautiful smile breaking through her exhaustion.
