Chapter 5 - Logan’s Corner
With my father forced out of Brooks Development and my mother turned away, only one member of the family remained who had the power to make the nightmare worse.
Logan.
Unlike my father, who was driven by ego and traditional pride, Logan was driven by something far more dangerous: desperate, reckless vanity. He had built an entire persona in Chicago as a wealthy, effortless nightlife mogul. His Instagram was filled with pictures of private jets, bottle service, and luxury trips—all financed by his father's stolen company money and unpaid bank credit lines.
On Tuesday afternoon, Logan launched his counterattack.
He didn't hire a lawyer. Instead, he went to the media.
I was sitting in my new executive office at Brooks Development, reviewing the quarterly financial audit with Marcus Vance, when my phone screen lit up with an alert from Chicago Sun-Times.
EXCLUSIVE: BROOKS DEVELOPMENT HEIR ACCUSES SISTER OF HOSTILE CORPORATE BETRAYAL AND PERSONAL VENDETTA.
I clicked the link.
The article featured an interview with Logan, sitting in one of his empty, closed Miami restaurants, looking sorrowful and wronged. In the interview, he claimed that I had used inside information obtained while managing the family's personal estate accounts to manipulate the secondary debt market, deliberately forcing Brooks Development into artificial distress so I could execute a cold-blooded takeover.
He even claimed that the forged signature on the Lakeview Bank application was a "setup"—suggesting that I had authorized the signature myself during an earlier family meeting, only to pretend it was forged later to humiliate him and destroy his expansion deal.
"This is insane," Marcus Vance declared, reading the article over my shoulder, his face thunderous. "This is outright defamation! We can file a libel lawsuit against Logan and the publication by four p.m. today!"
"A civil lawsuit takes months, Marcus," I said, rubbing my temples. "Logan doesn't care about a libel suit. He’s drowning in six million dollars of personal and corporate debt. He’s trying to manipulate public opinion to force me into giving him a settlement."
My desk phone rang. It was Claire.
"Natalie, have you seen the article?" she asked immediately.
"I'm reading it right now," I replied.
"It gets worse," Claire said, her voice grim. "Logan’s PR stunt just caught the attention of Lakeview's board of directors. Because he claimed in print that you authorized the signature, the bank's internal compliance committee is pausing all Northstar's corporate accounts pending an emergency review. They want you to appear before the board tomorrow morning at nine a.m. to clear your name."
I felt a cold drop of sweat trace down my neck.
Logan’s reckless lie wasn't just a nuisance. By accusing me of being complicit in the forgery, he was trying to drag me down into the federal fraud investigation with him. If Lakeview froze Northstar's operational accounts, we wouldn't be able to meet payroll for Brooks Development on Friday.
"He's playing chicken with a train," I muttered, my hands clenching into fists on my desk.
"He thinks you'll pay him off to make him shut up," Claire said. "He thinks you'll write him a check from Northstar just to protect your reputation."
I looked down at the article on my screen, at Logan’s polished, arrogant face staring out from the camera lens. He had spent his entire life expecting someone else to pay the bill for his mistakes. He thought he could lie, cheat, and destroy anyone in his path—even his own sister—because Dad had always been there with an open checkbook to clean up the mess.
"He picked the wrong sister," I said, my voice turning to liquid nitrogen. "Marcus, call the legal team. I want every text message, every email, and every bank transfer record between Logan, Dad, and Lakeview Bank compiled into a master evidentiary binder by midnight."
May you like
"What are you going to do?" Marcus asked.
"Tomorrow morning, I'm not just clearing my name with Lakeview Bank," I said. "I'm giving the federal prosecutors the rope they need to put my brother behind bars."
