Chapter 6 - THE FINANCIAL FALLOUT
Jackson's business ventures were always a house of cards,
but I was the glue that kept them from collapsing.
Without my credit score and my income,
the banks began to call in his loans.
He had been using my name to guarantee debts I didn't even know existed.
I spent the next month in a series of grueling meetings with forensic accountants.
We discovered that Jackson had forged my signature on three separate business loans.
Over five hundred thousand dollars in debt,
all tied to my assets.
My lawyer's eyes narrowed when she saw the documents.
"This isn't just a divorce,
Maya."
"This is a criminal case for fraud."
"Do you want to press charges?"
I looked at the forged signatures,
the shaky imitation of my handwriting.
He hadn't just hit me with a plate.
He had been trying to bury me under a mountain of debt while I slept beside him.
"Yes,"
I said,
the word feeling like a gavel strike.
"Press every charge we can find."
Jackson was arrested again,
this time for felony fraud.
The news hit the papers,
and the Sterlings' reputation officially dissolved.
Genesis tried to sell her house to cover the legal fees,
but the market was slow,
and the scandal made the property "poisoned."
She was forced to move into a small,
two-bedroom condo,
the very thing she had mocked others for.
I watched from a distance,
feeling a cold satisfaction.
They had tried to take my home,
and now they were losing theirs.
Jackson called me from jail,
using his one phone call to beg for mercy.
"Maya,
please!
If I go to prison,
I'll die!"
"Think about our years together!"
"I am thinking about them,
Jackson,"
I said,
staring at the scar on my temple.
"I'm thinking about the $1,200 a month I paid for your mother's ego."
"I'm thinking about the plate."
"And I'm thinking about the fact that you thought I was too stupid to catch you."
"Enjoy the food in there,
Jackson."
"I hear it's served on plastic."
I hung up and blocked the jail's number.
I was no longer the "useful woman."
I was the one who had dismantled the house of cards.
I felt a strange sense of loss,
not for the man,
but for the time I had wasted.
But as I looked at the blueprints for my new project—a community center for survivors of domestic violence—I knew that the time wasn't wasted.
May you like
It was a foundation.
And I was finally building something that would last.
