SCORNED EX WIFE Queen Of Ashes (Camille and Stefan) novel Chapter 217

Chapter 217

James Whitfield stood in his Manhattan office, watching surveillance footage of Alexander talking to Camille, Stefan, Hannah, and Victoria at the event, he saw the look of remorse on Alexander's face. His hands gripped the edge of his desk so tightly his knuckles turned white as he watched Alexander talk to them, and betray everything they had built together.

"Twenty years," James whispered to the empty room. "Twenty years of planning, and this weak-minded fool throws it all away for a woman who destroyed his uncle."

The rage burning in James's chest felt familiar, comfortable even. He had carried this anger for so long it had become part of his identity, as essential to his existence as breathing. But watching Alexander collaborate with the enemy brought that fury to a boiling point that threatened to consume everything in its path.

James turned away from the surveillance screens and walked to the wall where a single photograph hung in an expensive frame. The image showed a man in his fifties wearing a business suit, standing proudly in front of a construction site. The man's smile was genuine, his posture confident, his eyes bright with the satisfaction of honest work completed well.

"I'm sorry, Dad," James said to the photograph. "I'm sorry it's taken me so long to get justice for what they did to you."

The photograph showed Thomas Smith, a contractor who had built half the schools and hospitals in upstate New York before Victoria Kane and Richard Pierce destroyed his life. James touched the glass covering his father's face, remembering the strong hands that had taught him to use tools, the patient voice that had explained how buildings were constructed to last for generations.

Before Victoria Kane turned his father into a criminal.

James closed his eyes and let the memories wash over him, painful as acid but necessary to fuel his determination. Twenty years ago, Thomas Smith Construction had been competing for the largest municipal contract in the state's history - a new hospital complex that would employ hundreds of workers and establish the family business for the next generation.

Thomas Smith had submitted a fraudulent bid based on substandard materials and exploited immigrant workers who couldn't report safety violations. Victoria Kane and Richard Pierce had submitted an honest bid that exposed Thomas Smith's illegal practices when they reported him to the authorities.

When federal investigators discovered Thomas Smith's criminal enterprise, they found evidence of years of fraud, bribery, and safety violations. Workers had been injured on his construction sites because he used defective materials. Families had been cheated out of their savings through inflated contracts. Municipal officials had been bribed to overlook building code violations.

James remembered the day the federal agents came to arrest his father. The rage in Thomas Smith's eyes as they read charges of fraud, bribery, and conspiracy. The way his voice turned cold as he promised revenge against the people who had exposed his crimes.

"They think they've won," Thomas had said as they led him away in handcuffs. "But I'll make them pay for destroying my business. Victoria Kane and Richard Pierce will regret the day they crossed the Smith family."

But Thomas Smith never got his revenge. He died in federal prison three years into his sentence, killed by inmates who discovered he had been skimming money from a children's hospital construction fund.

James had been twenty-two when his father was arrested, a recent college graduate who had known about the family business's illegal activities but had chosen to look the other way. When the conviction became public, when the newspapers detailed Thomas Smith's extensive criminal history, James had changed his surname to Whitfield and disappeared from his old life.

He had spent three years building a new identity, creating a respectable background that had no connection to Thomas Smith Construction. By the time James emerged as James Whitfield, businessman and consultant, no one remembered that he was the son of a convicted criminal.

But James had never forgotten what Victoria Kane and Richard Pierce had done to his father's empire.

"I should have helped you get revenge," James said to the photograph. "I should have made them pay for exposing your business instead of running away and changing my name."

The investigation that followed had consumed James's life, but not to discover the truth about his father's innocence. James knew Thomas Smith had been guilty of every charge brought against him. Instead, James had spent years learning how to destroy Victoria Kane and Richard Pierce the way they had destroyed his father's criminal empire.

James had discovered that Victoria Kane and Richard Pierce were honest competitors who had simply reported criminal activity to the proper authorities. His father's downfall hadn't been the result of any conspiracy - it had been the natural consequence of years of fraud and corruption finally being exposed.

But James didn't care about justice or morality. He cared about revenge for the family business that had been taken away, for the wealth that had been confiscated, for the empire his father had built through crime and violence.

Victoria Kane had cost the Smith family millions of dollars by exposing their illegal construction practices. Richard Pierce had provided testimony that helped convict Thomas Smith and shut down the family's criminal enterprise.