«Julian, where’s your wife?»
«Sick again.» He smiled smugly and took a sip of champagne.
«Always something with her?»
«She’s very fragile. Maybe she’s lacking vitamins.»
«Maybe a brain too,» Courtney laughed.
And Julian felt the usual pleasure of his own wit. He liked beautiful women laughing at his jokes. He liked feeling like the center of attention, the master of the situation, the man to whom everything was permitted.
The phone on the table, next to the bottle of Dom Perignon, vibrated for the third time in the last hour. Julian looked at the screen and saw Dad again, his father. He probably wanted to know how the party was going or remind him of the meeting with investors tomorrow. It didn’t matter. He’d call him back in the morning.
He rejected the call and went back to watching the models in the pool. Life was beautiful. The phone rang again, and this time Julian finally answered because it was already the sixth call in a row and it was starting to irritate him.
«Dad, what is it? I’m busy.»
His father’s voice in the receiver was strange, not like always. Silas Sterling always spoke with confidence, clearly like a man used to giving orders. But now, in his voice, there was something unusual, something like fear.
«Son, where are you?»
«At the house with friends. Why?»
«I was just visited by the anti-corruption unit. They’re asking about the infrastructure contracts, about the 2014 projects.»
Julian sat up slowly on the lounge chair. The drunkenness began to dissipate from his head with alarming speed.
«Dad, that’s not something to talk about over the phone.»
«They know everything, Julian. Everything. They have documents, accounts, correspondence.»
«From where? Who leaked? Wait, I don’t understand. What documents? What are you talking about?»
«About what has kept our family afloat for the last 10 years. About the kickbacks, about the schemes, about the people we paid off. All of that is now in the hands of investigators.»
And the call cut off. Julian stared at the phone, trying to understand what had happened. Then he dialed his father again. Long rings, then the mechanical voice of the voicemail. Again.
Courtney noticed his expression had changed and moved closer.
«Hey, what’s wrong? Did something happen?»
«I don’t know. I probably need to… I need to make some calls.»
He stood up and walked away from the pool, dialing the family lawyer’s number. Busy. His uncle’s number at the DA’s office: «The number you have dialed is out of service or disconnected.» The number of his father’s business partner with whom they had built those infrastructure projects together: «The phone is off or out of the service area.»
Something was very wrong. Very wrong. Julian opened the browser on his phone and typed his father’s name into the search bar. What he saw made him grab the back of the nearest chair to keep from falling.
«Real estate mogul Silas Sterling detained on suspicion of million-dollar fraud. Scandal surrounding infrastructure projects. New details. Sterling family under investigation.»
What is known so far? And more, and more, and more. Dozens of headlines, each more terrible than the last. Julian scrolled through the news, feeling as if the ground were sinking under his feet. From where? How? Who could have done this?
One article caught his attention especially.
«Domestic violence in elite family. The wife of the heir to a commercial empire was repeatedly hospitalized for beatings.»
He opened it and saw his face in the photo. Next to it was a photo of Maya clearly taken from her social media. And under the photos, text that made him break into a cold sweat.
«According to sources in medical circles, Maya Sterling was admitted at least three times in the last eight months to different hospitals in the city with injuries characteristic of victims of domestic violence. Each time, her husband Julian Sterling insisted on the version of domestic accidents. And thanks to his family’s connections, these incidents did not receive proper attention.»
Further down was a video. That same video he had recorded a month ago when he was drunk and furious and wanted to show that fool who was boss in the house. He had forced her to speak to the camera saying she had fallen on her own. And he had laughed. And the girls around him had laughed too.
Now that video was on the internet. And hundreds of thousands of people had already seen it, according to the view counter.
Julian threw the phone onto the grass and covered his face with his hands. This was the end. The total and definitive end. Even if his father got out of the illegal kickback story, even if his uncle at the DA managed to fix something, in the criminal case, this video could no longer be erased.
It had spread across the entire internet. It had been shared by every major channel. Already, millions of people were discussing it in the comments.
Suddenly he realized that he had never before felt so helpless. All his life, any problem was solved by way of money or connections. You disrespected a cop and got a ticket? Dad called. You hit someone’s car and didn’t want to pay? The lawyer fixed it. You beat your wife until you almost killed her? The hospital director signed the necessary papers.
But now, all those mechanisms were useless. Because the information had been set free and had taken on a life of its own. It could not be bribed, intimidated, or crushed with authority. It simply existed. And with every minute, there was more of it.
Courtney and the other guests began to realize something. Someone was already looking at their phone. Someone was whispering. The festive atmosphere vanished as if someone had flipped an invisible switch. People began to leave, murmuring apologies and claiming urgent business.
Half an hour later, by the pool, only Julian remained, sitting on a lounge chair with an empty glass in his hand, staring into the darkness. The phone rang again. This time, the number was unknown. Julian answered mechanically, without thinking.
«Julian Sterling?»
«Yes.»
«This is Assistant District Attorney Martinez, Special Crimes Unit. You must report to give a statement. Tomorrow at 10 in the morning, I will dictate the address to you.»
He noted the address on a napkin he found on the table and hung up. His hands were shaking. His head was empty, like a ransacked house.
An hour later, he was speeding through the night city in his Porsche Cayenne, ignoring speed limits and rules. He needed to go see Maya. He needed to see her talk, understand what was happening. She should be in that private clinic where they normally took her after the incidents.
But when he arrived, the doctor on duty looked at him with barely disguised disdain and told him that Maya Sterling was not registered there.
«Then where is she?»
«As I understand it, at Atlanta General. In intensive care.»
Intensive care. That word hit him like a slap. He knew he had hit her harder than usual. He knew she had fallen badly and hit her head. But intensive care? That was already too much. That already exceeded what could be silenced and forgotten.
He drove to Atlanta General, violating every possible rule and miraculously avoiding an accident. At the hospital entrance, he parked directly on the grass, got out of the car, and rushed inside. In the lobby, he grabbed the arm of the first nurse he passed and almost shouted in her face.
«Where is intensive care? I need to see my wife, Maya Sterling.»
The nurse stepped back and pointed toward the elevators. Julian ran, not noticing the gazes that followed him from everywhere. He didn’t know that his face was already recognized by people who had read the news or seen that video.
He didn’t understand that to everyone else, he was no longer the heir to a wealthy family, but the man who beat his wife and filmed it on video.
On the third floor, security stopped him. Two burly men in uniform blocked his path and asked for identification.
«I’m the husband of a patient. You must let me through.»
«One moment. We’re going to verify.»
One of the guards called somewhere, spoke in a low voice, then looked at Julian with an expression that was hard to decipher.
«You cannot see the patient. Orders from the treating physician.»
«What do you mean I can’t? I have a right. I’m her husband.»
«The same husband who beat her for eight months straight?»
The voice came from somewhere to the side. Julian turned and saw a middle-aged woman in medical scrubs with a tired face and a gaze that boded no good.
«And who are you?»
«I’m the nurse who received your wife at this hospital three times. I saw her fractures, her bruises, her tears, and I called her father because someone had to protect her.»
«The father.» That word made Julian freeze. He knew Maya had a father, a rig worker from Savannah, who hadn’t appeared in their lives for years. Maya sometimes mentioned him when she was especially depressed, but Julian never took him seriously. What could a simple rig worker do against the Sterling family?
«Where is this father of hers?»
«In the room with his daughter. Unlike you, he came as soon as he found out.»
Julian moved toward the unit doors, but the guards blocked his path again. He tried to push them aside, but they were stronger than they looked. And a second later, he was face first against the wall with his arms twisted behind his back.
«Calm down, sir, or we’ll call the police.»
«Do you know who I am?»
«We know. The guy from the video who beats women and forces them to lie to the camera.»
Those words made him regain his sobriety better than any cold shower. He stopped struggling and let the guards take him aside. He stood leaning against the wall, breathing heavily, trying to understand what to do next.
At that moment, the door to intensive care opened, and out came a short, thin man with sunken cheeks and weathered hands, dressed in a simple jacket and worn jeans. Nothing special, just an ordinary middle-aged working man. But something in his eyes made Julian freeze.
The man approached, stopped a few paces away, and looked at Julian with a long, heavy gaze.
«So this is what you are, Julian Sterling. The prince on a white horse. The one who promised my daughter a fairy tale and gave her a hell.»
«Listen, I don’t know what they’ve told you, but this is all a misunderstanding. Maya just—»
«Shut up.»
A single word spoken in a low, quiet voice, but with so much force that Julian actually fell silent, as if his mouth had been sealed.
«I saw the video. I heard you laughing. I saw my daughter’s face when she says to the camera what you force her to say. I saw her in that room full of tubes and bruises. So don’t give me that misunderstanding talk.»
«How much do you want?»
This question escaped Julian automatically. All his life, any problem was solved with money, and he didn’t know how to think any other way.
«How much? A million dollars? Five? Ten? I’ll sign everything over to Maya. Penthouses, cars, accounts. I’ll give her a divorce without any conditions. Just stop all of this. Take down the articles. Erase the video.»
Elias looked at him in silence, and it was impossible to read any emotion on his face. Julian interpreted this as a signal to continue.
«I have money. Not as much as before, but enough. I can transfer to your account, say $200,000 right now. It’s not a bribe. It’s compensation for everything I did. For the pain I caused your daughter. I understand that money cannot fix the past, but it can help build the future. $200,000. $500,000. I’ll find that sum, even if I have to sell everything I have.»
«And what must I do for those $500,000?»
«Simply… simply stop all this. Tell the investigators you exaggerated. That Maya fell down on her own. That the video was recorded as a joke. A stupid joke. People will believe it. People always believe what they want to believe.»
Elias took a step forward, and Julian involuntarily stepped back. There was less than three feet between them.
«Do you know how much I make a year on my shift on the North Slope? A little over $15,000. $500,000 is almost 35 years of my work. A lot of money for someone like me.»
«There you have it. It’s good money. You could—»
«I didn’t finish. 35 years of work, and you think for that money I’m going to betray my daughter? That I’m going to tell the investigators she fell down on her own when I saw the video where you hit her? When I saw her in that room full of bruises and tubes?»
«It’s not a proposal of betrayal. It’s a proposal of compromise.»
«Compromise. Pretty word. And do you know what compromise you were proposing to my daughter all these months? ‘Shut up. Take it. Pretend everything is fine, and then I won’t kill you completely.’ That was your compromise.»
Julian felt the cold sweat running down his back. This conversation was not going at all as he had planned. The man in front of him did not react to money, did not fear threats, did not try to negotiate. He was simply standing there, looking at him like a boa looks at a rabbit.
«What do you want then? Tell me what you want, and I’ll do whatever it is.»
«Nothing.»
«What do you mean nothing? Everyone has a price.»
«I don’t have a price because I have nothing to buy. I have two or three months left to live. I have cancer, stage four. Money is useless to me because I won’t have time to spend it. Power is useless to me because there is no one to exercise it over, and no time to do it. The only thing I need is to know that my daughter is safe, and she will be safe only when you are in prison.»
Those words hit Julian like a sledgehammer to the head. Cancer, stage four. Two or three months. The man who had destroyed his life was himself on the brink of death. There was a monstrous irony in this, a cosmic injustice.
«Are you… Are you serious about the cancer?»
«Absolutely serious. I flew to the city to say goodbye to my daughter, not to get revenge on you, not to destroy your family. Just to say goodbye, because she hadn’t spoken to me in three years, and I wanted to see her one last time. And instead, I found her on the brink of death, and then I found out you had beaten her for eight months straight.»