Chapter 13 - The Fall of the House of Vance
At 7:00 AM the following morning, the grand glass-and-marble lobby of the State Capital Federal Courthouse was quiet, save for the early morning cleaning staff.
That quiet was shattered when Clara Vance—still dressed in her muddy orange jumpsuit, flanked by Guard Martinez and her frail, living father—walked through the metal detectors and demanded an immediate audience with the United States Attorney General’s regional director.
Two hours later, the storm had finally passed, giving way to a brilliant, crisp morning sun.
In a high-ceilinged conference room on the ninth floor, Arthur Vance signed a comprehensive forty-page affidavit detailing eight years of extortion, corporate fraud, abduction, and conspiracy to commit murder. Attached to the statement were bank account ledgers, private medical logs, and the original blueprints of the secret cellar holding facilities.
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By noon, federal marshals executed simultaneous arrest warrants at the Vance Corporate Headquarters and the primary estate.
Richard Vance was arrested in his office while attempting to wire eighteen million dollars to an offshore account in the Cayman Islands. Eleanor Vance was taken into custody at her home, her black grieving veil still lying crumpled on the hallway floor where she had dropped it after returning from the empty funeral.
