Chapter 3: The Investigation
Chapter 3: The Investigation
At 8:00 AM the next morning, Ethan was sitting in the mahogany-paneled conference room of his ruthless divorce attorney, Sarah Jenkins.
"The prenuptial agreement is ironclad regarding assets, Ethan," Sarah said, adjusting her glasses as she reviewed the file. "But she is legally your wife and Ava’s stepmother. If we file for an immediate restraining order and full separation, she is going to fight back. She’s accustomed to a certain lifestyle, and she knows a divorce will cut off her primary revenue stream."
"I don't care what it costs," Ethan said coldly. "Freeze the joint discretionary accounts. Cancel her credit cards. I want a private investigator digging into every second of her life for the past three years. If she was comfortable treating my daughter like a scullery maid, she was getting comfortable doing other things behind my back."
Sarah nodded, taking notes. "We need rock-solid evidence of the abuse. Courts can be tricky with step-parent discipline versus abuse. It will become a 'he-said, she-said' battle unless we have proof."
Ethan leaned back, a sudden realization washing over him. "The smart home system. Six months ago, she told me the internal security cameras were creeping her out, so I had the tech team disable them."
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"And did they?" Sarah asked, raising an eyebrow.
"I told my lead engineer to turn off the live feeds to the house panels so she wouldn't see them," Ethan murmured, a dangerous smirk playing on his lips. "But I never told him to stop the cloud backups."
